


even a sparrow falls

by distractedKat



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Attempted Rape, F/M, M/M, artificer Taako, blind taako, implied/threatened non-non, julia lives, one instance of non-con frotting, when stealing a century goes worse than expected
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-03
Updated: 2018-06-07
Packaged: 2019-03-26 06:43:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 50,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13852227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/distractedKat/pseuds/distractedKat
Summary: When Governor Kalen is routed from Raven's Roost, he has to gosomewhereto collect his forces before striking back.That somewhere ends up being Glamour Springs, where he makes a name for himself by capturing the criminal responsible for forty deaths: Taako, the famous wizard chef.Now Taako has to live with the fallout, injuries that change him and land him in the care of a bunch of weirdos, a new family destined to save more than just the world.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome! Uuuhhhh. Let me know if I missed any tags.
> 
> The ? on the chapters is because I don't know how to break up the fic, but it's written. 50k, shorter than the last one!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *CONTENT WARNING* for implied attempted rape. One scene of non-con frotting, one scene where the intention is graphic but it doesn't happen, and implication throughout because Kalen's a terrible person. You remember the song Hellfire from Hunchback of Notre Dame, 'cause that's how this whole thing started

The Grand Magistrate of Glamour Springs spent nearly a full year hunting down the monster who'd murdered so many of his people. Due to his predecessor's...squeamishness, the criminal had been allowed to run free, unpursued, for months. Now, though, the Grand Magistrate's reach, his power, extended far enough even for this.

His guards brought the criminal before him, dragged him in chains, bleeding and bound, to throw him at the Grand Magistrate's mercy.

Of course, he had no mercy. There was no room for mercy in governance, in the  _law._ The criminal would be executed in the public square to set an example. Outsiders need to know what to expect if they came into Glamour Springs with evil intent.

Then the criminal got his arms under him enough to push up, lift his head.

The Grand Magistrate's heart thumped. What a lovely creature, to have committed such an act. His eyes were large and gold, his hair long and bright even with the blood streaked through it. The figure under his ragged, torn clothing was...pleasing. Such a shame.

And he was wearing suppressant cuffs, too. A magical murderer.

The Grand Magistrate stepped off his dais to approach the criminal. The elf watched him warily, ears pinned low, panting through his gag.

Surely it would be a waste to destroy him. In this instance, a simple execution must not be a strong enough punishment. After all, he'd robbed them of the productivity of forty people. Who would take up that slack, if not this criminal?

The Grand Magistrate knelt to touch the elf's cheek, pressing harder when he tried to flinch away, grinding his head into the stone floor. Fear blossomed in those eyes, fear and pain, bubbling to the surface under such obstinance. 

Oh, yes. There were worse punishments than death, far worse than that easy release. The elf would regret his crime.

Grand Magistrate Kalen would see to it.

Kalen stood. "Take him to the dungeons," he ordered, turning his back on the elf.  He was dragged away roughly, without question.

A few hours alone ought to soften him up.

 

Taako landed on the cold, hard floor of the stone cell with a bone-jarring thud. He immediately scrambled to his feet, ignoring his aches and pains from the rough handling he'd been through over the last week or so of travel. "Aren't you going to take these off?" he demanded when the guards locked the door. Other than a sneer, they ignored him. Taako grabbed the bars to shake them angrily. "I haven't even had a trial! How do you chucklefucks know I did anything?"

"If you didn't do anything," one of them spat, "why did you run? Your guilt is confession enough, murderer. You'll be in here until they take you out for the hanging tree. No way we're letting you use magic to escape."

"I just wanted to make this place more comfortable," Taako muttered, trying to ignore how his heart was racing.  _Hanging tree._  Yup, time to bounce.

The other guard surged forward, grabbing Taako's shirtfront to yank him hard against the bars. Taako's forehead slammed into the metal, setting his whole world spinning toward darkness. "You're going to  _pay_ for the people you murdered," he snarled. "My  _brother_ among them! I'll dance on your grave, elf, if I have to do the killing myself."

Taako slumped to the ground when the guard let him go, pulled bodily away by his friend. The grabby one yelled all the way up the stairs, but Taako couldn't make out what he was saying over the ringing in his ears. His head throbbed in time with his frantic heartbeat, underscoring how badly he'd fucked up. They were gonna kill him, they were gonna– And he didn't even have any  _magic_ to break out. His head hurt and his body felt like one giant bruise, he couldn't straighten his left arm all the way and absolutely would not be able to support his weight for long on his left ankle. He was fucked.

He was  _fucked._

Time passed. He didn't know how much: There were no windows in the dungeon, no candles to watch burn low. The room had four cells, three of which were empty, and was lit by glowing white crystals tucked into sconces along the ceiling. Taako tried to pull himself together, tried to focus, to look for a way out, but he just– He just– His head swam when he lifted it. His arms shook when he pulled himself up the bars. He crashed back to the ground and lay still.

Maybe this was what he deserved. He'd killed...killed all those people. Maybe this was just–

Heavy footsteps sounded on the stairs. Taako lifted his head as high as he could, willed his eyes to open, to focus, and failed. The boots came to a halt right on the other side of the bars from Taako's slumped body. They were leather, polished to a perfect shine, just touched by the hem of a robe that looked like it had to be silk or something equally expensive. Taako thought he should probably care. He let his eyes slip closed.

A hand touched his head. It slid down, fingers pushing through his hair, until it came to a rest at the base of his skull. The hand gripped hard, wrenching Taako's head back. A potion was poured down his throat, catching in his gasp of pain with a splutter and harsh cough. Healing warmed through him, not enough to put him back in top shape but sufficient to calm his raging headache and numb some of deeper bruises. Taako opened his eyes with a sharp breath.

The magistrate who'd condemned him crouched on the other side of the bars, watching him with an utterly blank expression. Taako's fear spiked: why would the magistrate heal him? The hand in his hair tightened, shooting pain across his scalp. Taako hissed, trying to tilt his head back further to relieve some of the pain. The hold was too strong; he couldn't so much as wiggle.

"You can't kill me," Taako rasped, stifling a cry when the hand twisted impossibly tighter. "I haven't even had a trial!"

"This is Glamour Springs," the magistrate said. "I am the law here. You live and die when I say so."

"Then do it," Taako spat. "Fucking  _sadist,_ just do it if you're going to!"

The man chuckled. "I should," he said. "You killed forty of my subjects. I should slit your throat for it." He touched the long fingers of his free hand to Taako's throat, drawing a long line from his jaw down to the hollow between his collar bones. Then he pushed lower, forcing his hand down the neck of Taako's shirt to stroke his chest.

Taako's terrified heartbeat raced straight into fight or flight. He struggled, uncaring of how useless it was against the magistrate's strength. He planted his hands on the bars and pushed, trying to put some kind of distance between them. "Let go of me!" he shrilled. "Let go you fucking  _pervert!"_

The magistrate shook him harshly by his hair, slamming his head into the bars again before standing, dragging Taako up with him by that implacable grip. A cry of pain finally burst from Taako, fluttering with his panic as he was yanked up onto his toes and pulled tight against the bars.

"I could kill you now," the magistrate reiterated. "Do you understand me? Your entire life continues at my  _whim._  Your blood stays in your veins because I will it, and that could change at any second."

Taako tried to snap back, tried to fight down the tears of pain stinging his eyes. He pushed uselessly, one hand on the bars, the other sliding through to claw at the magistrate's elegant robes.

His desperation made the magistrate chuckle. "There is something... _pleasant_ about your face like this. I will give you a choice," he said, darkness in his tone, in the ugly twist of his smile, the glittering blue of his eyes.

"Gallows or beheading?" Taako gasped. "Neither, thanks."

"Nothing so vulgar," the magistrate said, a sneer in his voice. "Why would I give you power over your own death? You will burn, elf. My guards are preparing to build the stake for you even now."

Taako's heart hummed like a bird in his chest, terror shooting across his nerves like lightning.

"Your choice," the magistrate continued, looking pleased by Taako's palpable fear, "is to die in your pyre, or to give yourself to me. I am not unmoved by your beauty, tarnished as it is by your wicked spirit. Perhaps I can...rehabilitate you, in time. I will not sacrifice my attention for free, though. You will have to pay me. You will need to be..." He swept his eyes down Taako's body. "Creative, let's say."

Taako finally wrenched away. Well. The magistrate finally  _let him_ wrench away. He stood in the middle of the cell, mind whirling. He couldn't say yes. The magistrate was clearly a  _monster._ He couldn't say no, he'd be burned alive. But he couldn't– He couldn't–! The breath wheezed out of his lungs in a panicked sob.

The magistrate chuckled again. "It isn't such a terrifying prospect, being mine. I'll keep you safe, fed, out of the public eye. And I won't have my guards tie you up and set you on fire." He took a step away, hands folded behind his back. "Perhaps you need some time to adjust. I will keep you on as my servant. Not forever, of course. My leniency is finite, after all, and its depth will depend on how well you perform your duties.  _With_ your cuffs on. We can't have you using your magic to escape! If, when my patience runs out, you still find me... _repulsive_ as you do today, I will set you free, both from my service and from life. If you have learned to tolerate my generosity, we will..." His face twisted in a cruel smile. "Begin your  _real_ servitude. I will send a maid to clean you up. Your filth is disgraceful."

He left before Taako could reply.

Taako sunk to his knees and tried to breathe. Tried to think. Tried  _not_ to think.

This was good. This was a  _good_ mistake for the magistrate to make. As a servant, Taako would have access to the house, freedom to move around. He could plan an escape, with or without magic. Even if it put him closer to the magistrate's grasping, clammy hands. He just had to...to go with it until he found his exit. He could do this.

He had to.

 

A furious maid scrubbed Taako clean–scrubbed him nearly  _raw–_ and shoved a bunch of clothes in his arms. It could have been worse: The shift was long and ugly, but with the magistrate's threats running on a constant loop in the back of his head, he'd been half convinced they'd just give him, like, a loincloth and call it a day. 

The shift was hideous, but it wasn't too bad. He was too cold, barefoot, and all his magic was still locked away. On the bright side, he hadn't been dressed up like the main course for a one-man feast. 

Yet.

A set of guards came for him, marching him to what had to be the magistrate's–whose name he learned was Kalen–private estate. They gave him to the woman in charge of the household, and she ran him absolutely ragged with a variety of chores Taako had never done before. His hands calloused and split; his back ached; his elbow and ankle continued to hurt.

Nobody cared. If he complained, someone somewhere always found a way to make his life as a maid just that much worse. So he shut up, and he did what he was told, and he dreaded the early evening when Kalen came back.

Kalen's method of convincing Taako to submit to him involved a lot of being pushed against walls and pulled around by his hair. Of being forced to his knees to hold a cup of wine at just the right height while Kalen lounged in a chair reading, or pulled up onto to toes so Kalen could prove how much taller he was, or something. How much stronger. 

But Taako was an elf and Kalen was a human. Taako was an elf who'd spent his childhood neglected and abandoned by his people, hunted on the road, joining caravans of basically all the races  _other than_ elves. He already knew how weak he was, how physically helpless. That was why he'd brought Sazed on as help, why he'd taught himself magic. To make up for that disparity.

Now here Kalen was, driving it home over and over again that he just... he should have been a homeless elf in an elven city. He should never have looked for a future beyond his own people. Another elf would never trap him against a wall and bite bruises into his neck and shoulder. Would never make him a servant, a  _slave,_ in an attempt to kill his spirit.

It would work, too. Enough of this subjugation, with no friends or confidants, no one even to call him by name (everyone here just called him  _elf),_ eventually he would break. No being could withstand this forever.

So Taako let Kalen push him around. Let the staff abuse him. Ate the bread and water they allowed him without complaint, meditated when they said he could, for as long as they permitted, and kept his head down. He never forgot what Kalen's ultimate goal was.

He never stopped looking for a way out.

After about a month, Taako settled into a kind of routine. He cleaned from before dawn to whenever Kalen got back from his duties. He attended Kalen until the man went to bed, neither welcoming nor resisting his progressively more aggressive attentions. He meditated for a few hours, then was woken roughly by his guard to start again. He never had a moment to himself, which made figuring out an escape a little more challenging. Not impossible, but... This whole setup was just deeply annoying.

And then things changed. A little, and not necessarily for the better.

Any change at this point could be considered progress.

Kalen hosted a bunch of noble families for some event or other in his own manor, which meant Taako–the household's dirty, hated secret–couldn't be seen doing chores. Slavery was illegal in any land that traded with Neverwinter, and what land didn't? Taako's existence was a problem, if they found out. And if they'd set eyes on Taako for even a second, he would be  _sure_ that they found out.

A guard came for him in the morning, as usual. Instead of being brought to the witch who gave him chores, he was dragged upstairs to the attic.

Which ended up being an apothecary, or something? There were ten or twelve cauldrons bubbling throughout the room, shelves filled with weird and terrible ingredients stacked all the way to the ceiling, and four long tables cluttered with knives and discarded leftovers.

A shriveled old man inspected Taako closely, especially his hands, and made unhappy noises that ended with a begrudging, "He'll do."

Taako didn't ask what he meant. He'd learned not to.

The potions weirdo nudged Taako further into the room so the guard could slam and lock the door behind them. "This is where you'll stay until the visitors leave," the craggy, gnarled old man told him. "If you aren't useful, I will poison you. If you aren't competent, I will poison you. Kalen might complain, but I'm worth more to him that you are, and he'll get over it."

Not that different at all, then.

Taako had been a chef. He'd been a renowned chef, popular, able to wow and entertain while cooking, and generate rave reviews with the results. For almost all of his life, he'd earned his way through the world with his skills in a kitchen. His hands were better suited to working for the potions dude, honestly. He could chop and dice and sliver, he knew what a gram  _felt like,_ no scales required. Magic had made him flashy, practice had made him a professional.

The potions weirdo liked him. Kind of. More than anyone else in the manor, anyway. He didn't poison Taako or hurt him or sabotage his efforts. He didn't, like, use his name either, but whatever. Small mercies.

Another bonus: Taako couldn't be chucked back in the dungeons for sleeping since one of the visiting assholes might see him. He had to stay in the attic, even when the potions dude left for the day (whenever that ended up being, bro kept  _weird_  hours), and Taako couldn't be trusted alone with all those materials, duh. So he had a guard. But the estate was busy.

So he had only  _one_ guard.

Not young, no one was that stupid; kind of a plain dude in his, like...early middle human years. Whatever that meant for humans. Old enough to have a wife or husband, a family. Yet here he was, day after day, standing watch while Taako meditated, or while he cleaned and sorted the potions components. Taako was still only dressed in an ugly shift, but after months? In the same outfit?

He'd learned how to make it work. He could reliably draw the eye of nearly a third of the staff, depending on how he stretched or posed while cleaning, and they were all up in arms about him all the time. This guy? He was such an easy mark it was almost laughable. It was his  _job_ to watch Taako, and Taako had never met an audience he couldn't charm. A few "accidental" stumbles into the guard so he could feel manly for catching him, letting the guy find him in a dramatic and devastated moment of emotional weakness, roughly a week of muttering to himself just loud enough for the guard to hear–and he got his first smile. 

Perfect.

It took less than a fortnight for the guard to convince himself that they were in love, that he was a white knight who could save Taako from his fate, whether that ended up being death or Kalen. The guard (Ben something or other) didn't have access to the keys for Taako's cuffs, but whatever. They could worry about it later.

Kalen was throwing a huge ball soon, the final bash to top off whatever big shindig this thing had been. Ben would come for him during the great feast, when everyone else was busy. They would run away together, get married, live happily. Taako agreed, Taako  _vowed,_ to marry him, if Ben could get him out. Humans lives such a short time, after all. It was a small sacrifice for freedom.

The night of the party, Taako was ready. Ben came for him. He threw the door open like a storybook hero, two cloaks folded over his arms. Taako felt– Not happy, not even hopeful. But at least  _pleased_. The plan was actually coming together. He took a step forward, expression bright with the smile he knew Ben liked best. Ben's whole face lit in reply.

A sword pierced Ben through, back to front. He looked confused. He tried to speak and the only thing that came out was blood. Down his front, out his mouth, dribbling from the sword. Blood pooled under him when he was shoved off the sword to collapse on the ground like a sack of flour. Taako lifted his eyes from the body.

Kalen stood in the doorway, sword drawn and streaked with red. "Well?" he said, voice and face equally blank. 

Taako opened his mouth, thinking in a numb, slow way that he had to make excuses, distance himself from the escape, pretend it wasn't his idea. What actually came out was "He worked for you for fifteen years."

"He worked for Glamour Springs for fifteen years," Kalen said with a dismissive sniff, stepping over the body and the blood, not so much as a drop touching his gleaming boots. "He was a pawn. A toy for my use. He played his part, and now you know, don't you?" He pressed the sword to Taako's throat, herding him back against the wall. Taako's heartbeat thrummed in his chest, panic clenched tight like bands around his lungs. "You  _know."_

"What?" Taako said, barely a breath against the threat of that sword.

"You cannot escape me," Kalen hissed, looming over Taako. "You are  _mine, my prize!_ No one else will  _ever_ touch you again! I will not allow it! You brought his death with your little plan," he spat. "You killed him and inconvenienced me, and now you will make reparations for it." Kalen crushed his mouth to Taako's, biting and bruising him in a punishing kiss, rough with fury. He wound a hand into Taako's hair and yanked hard, groaning into Taako's helpless cry of pain. The sword cut into Taako's neck, a line of pain to match against all the rest.

Kalen lost some of the control he usually kept when he was...persuading Taako, rutting violently against him. Taako felt a surge of disgust, of his own fury, and tensed to push the magistrate away.

Then the wound at his neck throbbed. His eyes dropped to the corpse that had wanted to help him escape, a loyal man with dreams of being good.

Taako shut his eyes.

Kalen didn't stay long. He didn't take much more from Taako than the kiss, the... attention against the wall. He didn't have the time. His guests were waiting, still, and he'd made his point. Taako spent that night with the corpse and his own thoughts, shivering in the corner.

The next day, the potions weirdo told him which parts of a human male were useful in spells and gave him a set of knives.

Taako got used to it. To the way defeat sat on his shoulders, heavy like a blanket of shock. He did what he was told and he didn't lift his eyes. The visiting nobles eventually left. Instead of being sent back downstairs for cleaning, the potions asshole specifically requested keeping Taako as his assistant. Kalen let him, pleased by the way Taako flinched from the stain where Ben had died. Over time, the potions weirdo increased his responsibility, letting him take over more and more of the basic potions and poisons while he focused on some special project. He and Kalen were making... bombs, maybe? Some type of explosives that would adhere to anything they touched. Taako tried not to care about whatever town they planned to ruin, but it was hard when they kept saying its name over and over.

What kind of a name was Raven's Roost, anyway?

The day came when Kalen announced that he was leaving. He would be away for a week or so. He would set out the following morning.

And he required Taako's personal service at dinner, which he would take in his rooms.

The kitchen staff snickered. Taako did his best to look small and defeated and resigned. They gave him the meal and he took it up. Kalen was lounging at his desk in an open robe and sleep pants when Taako arrived. He had Taako set the tray down, then offered him a sip of wine.

"I won't drink anything you don't, elf," he said when Taako tried to demure. "You've been working with my apothecary for some months now. Do you think I'm stupid enough to let you poison me?"

Taako drank the wine. He tasted the food. He stood still while Kalen touched him, pushing a hand under his shift and up his leg while he waited to see if Taako got sick or died. But of course he didn't.

Kalen, satisfied, kept a hand on the back of Taako's thigh while he ate. His hand gripped hard when the sleeping drug started to take effect, but by then it was too late.

"Every poison has an antidote," Taako spat while Kalen started a slow collapse to the ground. " _Idiot."_  He kicked Kalen away. It would have been more satisfying to kill him, but the  _last_ thing he needed to give the people of Glamour Springs was another body. So he put Kalen to sleep and set to work looking for keys to his cuffs. He didn't look for very long; he didn't have the time. When he couldn't find them in ten minutes, he gave up, grabbed a cloak from Kalen's wardrobe, and fled. No one noticed him. He was free.

He was  _free._


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things get worse for Taako, and then there is a rescue. Which doesn't mean things get better. Featuring: Magnus, Julia, and Merle!
> 
> I'm posting this early because I'm at work at the library and everything's broken?? So I might as well be productive SOMEWHERE.
> 
> CONTENT WARNING for implied attempted rape. Nothing graphic, it's not successful, but a *lot* of implication

Magnus Burnsides was having a fantastic day. He was on his way to the Continental Craftsmen Showcase with a rocking chair he  _knew_ would do well, hopefully drumming up more business for the Hammer and Tongs. Everyone in this inn seemed to like hearing about his Julie, their cottage, Raven's Roost, all of it. They kept the ale coming and the conversation lively.

Not a bad first night away from home, really.

When he was finally ready to call it a night– not  _too_ late, Julia'd never let him live it down if he overslept on the first day– he left a crowd of new friends behind him.

One of them seemed to actually want to be more than friends, if the way he was waiting for Magnus in the hallway meant anything. He seemed nervous, huddling in a black cloak with the hood pulled up.

Poor guy was probably drunk. "Sorry, buddy," Magnus chuckled, reaching out to rest a hand on the guy's shoulder. "I'm a happily married man! Let's get you somewhere comfy to sleep this off."

The guy flinched out from under his hand. "I'm not here for a booty call," he hissed, glancing around furtively. "And I'm not  _drunk,_ god. I'm here to warn you!"

Magnus blinked. "About what?"

"You have to get back to Raven's Roost. Something terrible is gonna happen.  _Soon."_

Magnus felt the smile melt from his face. "Is that a threat?" he asked carefully.

The figure huffed a frustrated sigh. "No, idiot! I literally just said it's a  _warning._  Someone... a real bad dude, he's got some beef with it. His personal apothecary has been cooking up some scary sticky bombs, and if you don't evacuate the city I think he's going to blow the whole thing."

Magnus rushed in without thinking, grabbing the figure by his shoulders to give him a shake. "When!"

The cloak's hood feel back to reveal an elf, lovely even for his race, with golden hair and equally golden eyes, wide now in what looked like terror. His mouth worked but he couldn't seem to get any words out. It occurred to Magnus that he had hauled the elf right off his feet and was probably bruising his arms with his grip.

Jeez. What would Julia say if she could see him now? What would she do, if she were here?

Magnus set the elf down gently, trying to show how sorry he was for hurting him. He wanted to straighten the cloak, but resisted the urge when the elf flinched again. "I'm sorry," he said, voice low and sincere, as soothing as he could make it. "I bet you risked a lot to come here and warn me, huh? I'm sorry, buddy, I won't hurt you. You don't have to be afraid."

"Who's afraid?" the elf challenged in a voice so dry it cracked. He cleared his throat, swallowed hard a few times. "Look, I don't have a lot of time, I just–"

"Have you eaten?"

The elf blinked at him.

Magnus tried to radiate safety. "I won't hurt you, and, no offense, buddy, but you look like you could be knocked over by a strong breeze."

"I don't have  _time_ for eating," the elf hissed.

"I'm Magnus." He stuck his hand out.

The elf rolled his eyes and shook his hand. "Taako. Now can we  _please–"_

"Hey what's this?" Magnus pulled Taako's hand closer to examine the thick metal cuff around his wrist.

"Let me– Let me go," Taako shrilled, terror back even though he didn't pull his hand away.

Didn't dare to?

"I'm not gonna hurt you," Magnus swore. "I just want to help. If you come with me, I think I can get these off."

"I'm not going anywhere with anyone," Taako snapped, finally yanking his hand back. He hid both arms deep within his cloak. The glare he leveled on Magnus could have lit a fire. "Listen. A guy is coming for your home. He's coming  _now,_ and you have to get your friends out or you aren't gonna have any. Get it?"

"What guy?"

Taako made a low screeching sound of frustration. "Does it matter!"

Magnus shrugged. "It might."

The elf dropped his gaze, looking... afraid, maybe. Something dark. Just to say a name? Who hell could make someone–

"Kalen, okay? He's the magistrate of Glamour Springs, and his name is Kalen. He's got bombs and he's on his way there right now." Taako glanced up before looking away again. "I might already be too late, but I had to try. I couldn't do anything last time and I just–" He swallowed hard. "It's stupid. It's  _so_ stupid. But I had to try."

Magnus felt like his entire body was made of ice. Julia was in Raven's Roost. Steven. Everyone he knew and loved, his whole world was–

Panic shot through him, narrowing his vision to a tunnel of determination. He left his room, all the belongings he'd brought, the chair and wagon. He took his horse and rode, flat out, until the familiar shape of Raven's Roost rose up before him. It wasn't yet dawn when he burst into his home, all but carrying Julia from their bed outside, babbling about the coming danger. Julie squirmed out of his hold, raided the hall closet for her bow, arrows, and sword, and led the charge to wake up all their neighbors.

Kalen attacked. He razed the Craftsman Corridor, blowing it to unusable rubble. 

By then, the whole town was empty, hiding in the forest. When Kalen's forces marched, the people of Raven's Roost were ready. Julia organized the attack, commanding her forces with the same bird calls and sign language she'd used to triumph over Kalen in the first place. Magnus led the frontal assault, charging in with the best warriors Raven's Roost had to offer. In the end, they lost part of their home, but Kalen lost most of his remaining loyal soldiers. The sniveling coward wasn't there himself, of course, but that wasn't a surprise. And it didn't matter. He'd done his worst, and now they were free to find him on their own terms. 

Julia ordered the militia to march their captives to Neverwinter to face trial, and then she and Magnus got ready to hunt for Kalen.

"How did you know?" Julia asked Magnus when they stood in the ashes of their little cottage, hands gripped tight as they looked for any surviving supplies. "Bear, how could you possibly have known?"

For the first time, Magnus remembered the elf. Fear gripped his heart. "Taako," he breathed. "There was an elf, back at the inn on that first night. He told me. I think...I think he escaped from Kalen. And he could have kept going but he stopped to warn me."

"We have to find him," Julia decided with a firm nod.

"How?" Magnus asked, ready to follow her but not sure about the actual method. "We know enough about Kalen to track him down, but Taako? I barely remember what he looked like, Jules. I'm sorry, I–" He shrugged helplessly. "I panicked. I didn't even think about him until just now!" He signed and rubbed his forehead. "Some protection fighter I am. He could be anywhere!"

Julia socked his arm. "You always forget." She tapped one thumb against her own chest. "I'm a ranger, Mags. Finding people is a specialty. And if Taako's not free, as much as it sucks for him, he'll be with Kalen, which makes for an easy two-fer. Let's hope he's not, let's hope it's just an old trail to a forest hideout. But!" She nodded firmly. "Either way, I can find him."

Magnus grinned at his wife, shining with the force of her determination. "So what're we waiting for!"

They left Raven's Roost's rebuilding in Steven's hands. He understood why they had to find the elf, either just to thank him or to offer him somewhere safer to hide from Kalen or for an actual rescue. Taako had risked a lot for them, and they owed him a reward.

Magnus brought Julia back to the inn. After apologizing for skipping out on his bill and giving the owner a healthy tip, Magnus was able to use his rustic charm to get the skinny on what'd happened after he left.

It was the nightmare scenario: The elf had been caught. He'd stayed too long talking to Magnus, caused too much of a ruckus, and someone else had seen the cuffs. They'd tied him up, given him over to Kalen's men when they came for him, and never realized the evil they'd likely set in motion.

"Apparently he was a real bad dude," the innkeeper said while cleaning a mug. "Killed a bunch of people in Glamour Springs! Poison or something. Lucky they caught him before he could kill anybody else, eh?"

"Why would a real bad dude warn me about Kalen's attack?" Magnus asked while he and Julia packed fresh supplies in their reclaimed wagon. "Why wouldn't he just run? He got captured here because he didn't  _run,_ Julia. Whatever Kalen does to him now, that's my–"

Julia nudged him hard in the side with her elbow. "No. What Kalen does is Kalen's fault. Don't you take that on yourself, Mags. We can't stop him from arresting Taako, that already happened, but we know where he is. We know what he looks like. If he's alive, we can save him."

 _"If_ he's alive." Magnus looked down, mouth pressed into a hard, unhappy line. "Kalen's a sadist, who knows if there's anything left of that elf."

"You didn't seem this pessimistic at home," Julia said, climbing up into the wagon. "Are you saying we shouldn't try?"

"Of course not!" Magnus exclaimed, following her up. "How could you even say that?"

"Then what are we arguing about?" she asked, taking the reins from him. "Forget about what  _might_ happen, or what we  _could have_ stopped. What's going to happen is we're going on an adventure. We're going to save Taako, find Kalen, and bring that asshole to justice. Then Taako's gonna come live with us and everything's going to be  _amazing."_

"Yeah!" Magnus cheered. "Let's do it! Save the elf, capture the bad guy, and home in time for, like, Candlenights or something, I guess, how long do adventures take?"

Julia laughed. "I guess we'll find out!"

Glamour Springs wasn't actually all that glamorous. It was smaller than Raven's Roost, not much different from any quaint little town on the very outskirts of Neverwinter's influence. They didn't even have a governor. They had a magistrate.

Kalen.

Julia put disguises together for both of them, changing enough about them so fucking Kalen probably wouldn't recognize the leaders of the rebellion that'd ousted him. He was holding, like, an open house or something, taking requests and comments from his  _subjects._  Letting passers-by or new residents view him and worship, the pretentious fuck.

Magnus knew his strengths, and he knew his weaknesses, and he let Julia take the lead. They didn't offer tribute other than some coins (fake) dropped into a collection bowl type thing at the entrance of the Hall of Justice Kalen had turned into a weirdo cathedral to himself. Magnus let himself get distracted by planning exactly how he'd take out all the assorted guards between him and Kalen if Julia said it was a good idea. It wouldn't be easy, but it'd be  _fun,_ and that was probably better. 

Seemingly without reason, Julia drew a low, deep breath that would have been a gasp if she'd given it more volume. Magnus looked around in confusion. When he saw what Julia did, his hand shot out to wrap around hers, squeezing tight.

Kalen sat on a throne in the front of the chamber, graciously accepting gifts and worship. He smiled and waved, behaving more like a king than a magistrate. His people seemed happy to worship, pleased by him, his words and his spectacle. It was obnoxious, but not particularly shocking. He'd run a similar show in Raven's Roost, after all.

What  _was_ shocking was the humanoid figure slumped by the throne, collapsed against its side like a corpse.

Taako.

The elf looked  _awful,_ dirty and bloodied, covered in nothing but a torn shift and bruises. His wrists and ankles were bound in chain, his hair hung in matted tangles across his face and over his shoulders. Worst of all, filthy bandages wrapped around his head, across his eyes, hiding some terrible wound.

"We come back for Kalen later," Julia murmured, expression hard as she led Magnus from the room. "Tonight, our mission is Taako."

Magnus was the distraction. His job, once the sun set and they were able to figure out where Taako was being kept (Kalen's bedchambers, the disgusting  _monster),_ was to make an enormous ruckus, bad enough that their hated enemy would have to investigate on his own. Julia, meanwhile, would sneak in, get Taako, and meet him back at the wagon in an hour.

There were a lot of ways Magnus could have made his commotion. It wouldn't be hard to pick a fight with the guards, cause a riot. He could pretend to be in need of a magistrate's particular talents, willing to pay large sums for a quick reaction. There were options.

Magnus burned the Hall of Justice to the ground.

It took a while to set up; he needed accelerants and had to do a lot of sneaking. Seeing Kalen's face when he ran out to watch his makeshift temple burn?

Priceless.

Magnus beat Julia back to their wagon. He refused to worry. She had the harder job, after all, and would have to sneak Taako back with her. Luckily there was a lot of forest for her to sneak in: it was her very favorite terrain, and she could make a lot happen in a forest. By the time Julia did get back, Taako slumped piggyback against her, arms dangling limply over her shoulders, Magnus was ready for them. He had a nest of blankets and pillows ready for the elf, the reins ready for Julia, and snacks for all three of them. He couldn't get Taako to wake up enough for eating, but Julia was happy to munch as they slipped quietly away.

"We need a healer," she said that first night, checking Taako as best she could by the light of the moon. They didn't dare light a fire, not this close to Glamour Springs. "I found him in– They tossed him on Kalen's bed like a  _doll_ ," she spat. "He was just– He isn't responding, and that's  _bad,_ Mags. I don't dare remove his bandages, his eyes look... they look burned, like someone threw acid at him. And he's been beaten half to hell. Even if we had a potion, I don't think–"

"We'll find a healer," Magnus swore. "I don't care what I have to do, I'll find a healer for him. There has to be one nearby. I heard of a gnome named Craig who's good about finding people. I'll get him to find one for us. Taako's gonna be okay, Jules. He's gonna come live with us."

Craig the gnome did good work. He was discreet and quick and got a healer to them within a few hours of Magnus approaching him with the job. It took most of their remaining gold, but Taako needed help  _bad._

Their healer was a cleric, a dwarven follower of Pan, named Merle Highchurch. Apparently he was only passing through this... town, or whatever, did it even have a name? Anyway he was only passing through, was some kind of nomad, and just needed some coin before moving on. Magnus collected him from the inn where he had told Craig they were staying, then led him to the hidden cave in a secluded forest glen where they'd  _actually_ set up camp. He seemed suspicious, but not enough to back out. Magnus had only paid him half up-front for a reason. He wondered if he'd have to add a bribe for Merle's silence, just in case.

Then the old dwarf set eyes on Taako.

He was slumped against Julia where they sat by their little fire, head resting in the curve of her shoulder. She was trying to get him to drink some water without any success, looking sad and desperate. The encouraging words she whispered into Taako's hair weren't helping. When Magnus and Merle walked in, she looked up with tears wet on her face. "I think he's dying," she croaked.

Merle spat a curse and rushed forward. "What did y'all do to him!" He cupped one hand under the base of Taako's skull, moving the other down his body, head to toes, hesitating over his eyes, his chest, his left ankle. When the dwarf looked up, his expression was twisted with pain. "I don't... I don't know what all Craig told you about my abilities," he said, voice low. "But I'm not– I don't usually advertise as a healer. All I've got is some real basic spells, I'm only about a level one cleric. I don't know if I can–"

"He's dying," Julia repeated, reaching out to grip Merle's free hand over Taako, who hung limp between them. "I'm a ranger, Merle, and Magnus is a fighter. You've got to see you're our only hope here."

"You need to take him to a hospital," Merle insisted. "He needs real care from trained professionals–!"

Magnus knelt by Taako to touch one of the shackles on his ankle. "We can't. There's a guy–a real bad guy–who did this to Taako. And the law hasn't caught up with that dude yet. He'll come for Taako if we don't keep him safe."

"Maybe he should," Merle grumbled even as the hand he had at the base of Taako's skull began to glow with healing energy. "Do you even know why this bad guy wants your friend?"

"The bad guy bombed our home," Julia said flatly, "and the only reason a lot of people aren't dead,  _including me,_ is because Taako sacrificed his chance at escape to warn us. I don't care what Kalen  _thinks_ Taako did, he didn't. Taako is a good person, and we're going to protect him. So you're going to heal Taako, however long it takes." She looked up at Magnus, eyes hard and determined. "And we're going to catch whoever framed Taako in the first place. Once he's free, he'll be able to testify against Kalen, and we'll have him. What he's done to Taako, even as a prisoner, is..." Her jaw worked furiously. "He'll pay for that too. But first, we have to make sure Taako survives." She turned back to Merle. "So that's on you. I don't care if you don't have a sixth-level healing spell. You're a cleric of Pan, and I'm a ranger. Tell me what plants you need."

"It might not be enough," Merle told her, rubbing a hand over his eyes with a weary sigh. "But okay. We can try. I need a piece of paper and something to write with. And for Pan's sake, get me some water! This poor shit needs a thorough sponging." Magnus scrambled to obey. Meanwhile, Merle started a closer investigation, listening to Taako's lungs and flexing his ankle and pealing back the bandages across his eyes to wince at the injuries hidden there. "He might be a little fucked as far as eyesight goes," Merle said, more to himself than either human. When Magnus came back, Merle handed the paper and pencil to Julia. "Switch with your husband, I need some muscle to get the elf cleaned up."

Merle dictated a list of plants he'd need, specifying if he wanted the leaves or flowers or roots or the whole thing, adding more and more as more of Taako was uncovered. He needed balms for bruising, ointments for joints, salve for the burns that cut a gruesome path from temple to temple across Taako's eyes. Taako was rail-thin, nearly skeletal, and would eat a lot of broth and thin soup before they could work him back up to the hearty meals he so desperately needed.

"I've never seen anything like this," Merle admitted, voice brittle with shock and growing rage. "No creature in Faerun could deserve this kind of treatment." Despite his tone, his hands were gentle as he washed the grime and blood from Taako's skin. "Add bandages to that list," he added.

For the first time, Julia hesitated. "I...don't think we can afford any," she admitted. "We can boil the old ones and–"

"I'm not taking gold from this dying elf's medical fund," Merle protested in outrage, dunking his bathing sponge with enough vigor to splash water over the sides. "You can owe me but his bandages come first. You think Pan's gonna answer the call of a cleric who thought getting paid was more important than fresh  _bandages?_  Fuck off. And get me some clothes for this poor elf. And  _who's_ gonna take these Pan-damned cuffs off him!"

"My clothes would probably fit better," Julia said, getting up to rummage in her bags. "Mags, do you think you can take care of the cuffs?"

"I just need a small enough hammer," Magnus agreed. He shifted his hold on Taako to start rummaging through his pockets. "I can crack the hinges pretty easy, but it'll take some focus and–"

Merle smacked Magnus. "I don't think so, buddy! You're not getting a hammer anywhere  _near_ my patient until he's stable. His joints are  _shit,_ you're not tappin' on 'em with a hammer, I don't care  _how_  small it is!"

"Okay!" Magnus put his free hand up, keeping the other curled around Taako's shoulders. "Okay, jeez, sorry! I won't, fine, I'll leave it. I just thought he'd like having them off. I think... I think he's had them for a while."

"Yeah, seems like," Merle sighed, touching the edge of a wrist cuff where the skin was red and irritated. "I just can't believe someone could do this to–"

Julia sat up sharply, looking toward the cave entrance. "Shh," she hissed when Magnus opened his mouth to ask what was wrong. She crept toward the branches she's set up to disguise the cave. "Everyone be absolutely quiet." Even Merle froze, locked in place by the intensity of Julia's warning. Eventually, Magnus heard what Julia had: footsteps moving toward them across the glade. He held his breath, curling protectively over Taako's limp form. His proximity made the elf produce a terrible, high-pitched whine, quiet only because of how weak his lungs were, how diminished his strength. Magnus felt his heart break. He looked up, catching Merle's eye, and saw his own pain reflected there.

After nearly half an hour, Julia relaxed. "We need to find a safer place for long-term care," she murmured, finally rejoining them with a shirt and pants for Taako. "Farther from here. As far as we can get without making him worse."

"You'd better have room for one more in that cart, then," Merle said, helping Magnus slide Taako into the clothes. "I'm not leaving my patient in this condition."

"Thank you," Julia said, shoulders slumping with relief. She lifted the completed list. "I'm gonna go get this stuff, shouldn't take more than a few hours. I'll try to find some game for us while I'm at it, save the supplies for emergencies."

When she was gone, Merle turned to Magnus, expression hard. "Tell me everything," he said.

Magnus did. About Raven's Roost, Kalen, the rebellion. About winning, leaving for the competition, Taako finding him. About saving his people if not his home, defeating Kalen's men, going after Taako. He spared no detail of how Kalen had displayed Taako to his loyal subjects, the spectacle he'd made of the whole thing. Merle grinned viciously when Magnus described how the Hall of Justice had burned.

"I've been lookin' for something good to do for a while," Merle admitted, looking down at Taako where he was laid before the fire in a pile of blankets. "A purpose, y'know? Seems like saving the kid, bringing that asshole to justice, might just be it. You're stuck with me, tough boy," he told Magnus.

"Thank Pan," Magnus sighed, slumping in relief. 

"Do that later," Merle said. "Right now, I need more water, and I need it boiling. For when Julia gets back."

"Yessir," Magnus said, jumping up.

It took three days before Merle felt comfortable enough with Taako's progress to allow them to move him. In that time, Taako woke up only once. Merle was re-applying the burn salve to the splash of damaged skin across the elf's face, and he came to with a gasp and a cry. He started shouting in fractured elvish, struggling weakly against Merle's surprised hold. 

Magnus rushed over, pulling Taako gently into his arms. "Hey, hey, shh," he murmured, taking Taako's hand and holding it against his own face so he could feel how different it was from Kalen's, feel the beard and rough skin. He winced when Taako's nails dug in hard, clawing marks across his cheek before his bony fingers caught and curled into his sideburns. "It's me," Magnus told him, low and soothing. "It's Magnus, do you remember? You warned me about Raven's Roost, you saved my people. I came back for you, my wife Julia and I got you out. We have you now, you're safe with us. Do you remember me?"

Taako's huge gold eyes looked right though him, seeing... seeing  _nothing._  Their worst fears realized. "Magnus?" he panted, grip spasming in his beard. "Th...the human? Magnus? I found you in the inn, I– He's going to bomb your town, he killed Ben, I can't let him–"

"And you didn't," Magnus swore, resting his hand over Taako's. "You warned me in time, you saved us. And now we're saving you."

"He killed Ben," Taako gasped, nearly a sob. "He killed him, he killed him, and I can't– I can't see anything, Magnus, why can't I– He threw– I was making potions again, making potions out of  _Ben_ and he threw– I can't  _see, Magnus,_ I can't see Kalen where is he where is he hiding I  _can't–_ "

Merle touched a hand to Taako's forehead, murmuring a spell. Taako sighed and went limp, tears still sliding down his face.

"Well fuck," Julia said, voice tight with her own tears. "That went like  _shit."_

"He's still got a pretty serious fever," Merle said, already back to applying the burn salve. "It'll go better when he's not busy boilin' his brain."

Gods, Magnus hoped so.

Once Taako could travel, they bundled him up and made for Neverwinter. Kalen wouldn't look for them there, and even if he did, the city was so dense with people their trail would be basically impossible to follow. Julia found them a small, cheap apartment to share, with one bedroom they took turns using while the others did odd jobs for money or kept watch over Taako.

He was improving. With time and patience and access to running water, he slowly got better. The next time he woke, Julia was with him. She only realized he was conscious when tears began spilling down his cheeks.

"Oh, honey!" she cried, dropping her book to rush to his side and take his hand. "Sweetheart, what hurts? Can you tell me? Merle left your burns uncovered to breathe for a bit, but he has some tea that should help with–"

"You should go," Taako croaked. "Before he gets back."

Julie smoothed the hair out of Taako's face. "Before who gets back, honey? Magnus? He's just out getting food, he'll be–"

"Kalen will come," Taako said, sightless eyes trained on the ceiling, disturbingly hazy for how intent his focus was. "Kalen always comes. He'll find me. You should go."

"No," Julia swore. "Taako, sweetheart, we won't let him, we're gonna–"

But Taako was already asleep again. Just as well. She didn't figure he would've believed her anyway.

"We have to prove he didn't do it," Julia told Magnus as soon as he got back to their little apartment.

He blinked at her. "...What?"

"Taako. He didn't poison those people, and we have to prove it."

"Okay," Magnus agreed. "How?"

She didn't know.

As it turned out, one of Julia's co-workers at the local stables where she worked part-time did. "There's a guy," she said when Julia finished lamenting to her about how hard it was to solve big mysteries. "He sometimes does jobs in Neverwinter. I don't know what he looks like, or his name, but they say he works with the militia sometimes. They say he can figure anything out. People call him the world's greatest detective."

Julia started hunting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> GUESS WHO


	3. Chapter 3

Angus McDonald always had people looking for him. He was the world's greatest detective, after all, and his services were useful to a lot of folks in a lot of ways. Usually he could figure out why, and then decide whether or not to let them find him. 

This time was different.

There was a woman, somewhere in her late twenties, likely a ranger, with brown skin and black hair and dark gray eyes, tracking him through the city. Well. Not  _him,_ really, she hadn't seemed to realize that Angus wasn't an adult quite yet. She was tracking the rumor of him, though, more skillfully than he would've guessed she could. She looked like she wasn't from around here, not from a major city, or really any city at all. What would a country ranger want with Angus?

After a few days, he approached her on his own, following her back to the little apartment where she lived with at least two other people. He waited a few minutes, then knocked. The quiet talking on the other side of the door fell silent. Angus logged their panicked shuffling away as another clue for later.

The ranger opened the door. Her gaze was high, locked in a glare at adult level, and it took her a second to realize Angus was a bit lower than that. When she finally looked down at him, her glare had melted into a confused blink. "...Are you lost?" she asked, with just a hint of country accent.

Hm. "Hello, ma'am," he said, sticking his hand out for a professional shake that she returned mostly out of reflex. "My name is Angus McDonald. I'm the world's greatest detective. You've been looking for me, and I'd like to know why."

"You're what?" she asked blankly, then seemed to shake herself. "I don't know what you're talking about, but you–"

"If you don't let me in and tell me what you want me to do," Angus said, "then you won't ever find me again. I don't have a lot of time between cases, but depending on what you want I might be able to squeeze you in. That window is closing, though. The harder you look for me after this," he said when she bit her lip indecisively, "the more attention you'll draw to yourself. I know you don't want that, ma'am."

"It won't be a  _squeeze in_  kind of thing," she said with a deep sigh. She stepped away from the door. "Come on in, then. We'll tell you the whole story."

Angus walked into the small apartment and took stock. There was a large man in the kitchen, pretending to be cooking so could keep his hands full of knives. A dwarven cleric sat crossed-legged in the middle of the room, leaning back against a couch that had been hastily turned around, pretending to meditate. Assorted medicines and bandages were piled on every available surface. The corner of a blanket curled over the top of the couch.

Oh no.

"Who did this?" Angus demanded, circling the couch to set eyes on their secret patient. An elf laid buried in blankets, covered from the shoulders down. Bandages wound over his eyes, around his head. He breathed with a slight rattling sound and looked to be deeply unconscious. "You wouldn't keep him here in this condition unless you were hiding him from someone with a lot of power," he said, unable to keep the building fury from his voice. "Is it someone in the militia? Someone who works for the Lord of Neverwinter? No, you would have left town with him if it happened here, you're running from someone with power out in the country. Who!" he shouted, turning to the adults.

The ranger and the cleric hesitated.

The man in the kitchen set down his knives. "His name is Kalen," he said. "Julia and I–I'm Magnus, by the way, that's Merle and Taako's on the couch–we're from a small town called Raven's Roost. Kalen started there as governor. It didn't take him long to go from a pretty good ruler to a megalomaniacal dickbag. Julia and I–" He hitched a thumb toward the ranger (his wife?) "–we led a rebellion, got him out of there. Apparently he set up shop in a town called Glamour Springs as their magistrate, the fucker. They're all under the impression Taako's a real bad guy, did something, killed a bunch of people."

"It's not true," the ranger, Julia, insisted. "It can't be true."

Magnus nodded. "Yeah, we don't know what went down, but we know it can't've been Taako. He's not that kind of guy. I guess he got caught for the thing and given to Kalen, who treated him real bad, judging by the way Taako flinches and how fucked up he is physically. He escaped, somehow, and found me, warned me Kalen was coming back to Raven's Roost to blow us up. I was able to get back in time to evacuate the town, but Taako..." Magnus swallowed hard, guilt darkening his face when he looked at the elf bundled on their couch. "He got recaptured. It's bad, Angus. Whatever Kalen did to him was  _real_ bad. He's blind now, in a lot of pain, scared to death when he wakes up, which isn't often. We're doing the best we can, but..." He scrubbed a frustrated hand over his head.

"You want me to investigate what happened in Glamour Springs," Angus realized. "Exonerate Taako so you can charge Kalen with his false imprisonment, and everything that happened afterward. Why not just go after him for Raven's Roost?" he asked. "Surely you have enough evidence for that."

"The people of Glamour Springs–" Julia looked away when Angus turned to her. The muscles in her jaw worked hard as she fought down the anger radiating from her posture. "They knew what he was doing," she spat. "He had Taako on display when we got there, letting them all see what he'd done to him. Not one of them said  _anything."_

"Not just Kalen then," Angus summarized. "You want me to solve the crime so the whole town will be held responsible."

"He threw Taako on his bed like a toy," Julia said, voice hoarse. She shut her eyes against whatever memory was rising up. "He propped him against his fucking throne by day, and tossed him in his bed at night. None of those people tried to help him. Even if Taako had done what they accused him of, he didn't deserve that."

Angus looked at Taako again, his pale, gaunt face, and wondered what shape the rest of him was in. What had Taako lost to the town of Glamour Springs? "He might be guilty," Angus said, watching Julia's face. "I could solve the case, and it could be Taako."

"No." The ranger's whole body shifted into a steadfast, certain stance. "I know people, and I know what Taako did. What he sacrificed for us. There's more to this story than that. I can feel it in my bones."

"I suppose asking about a retainer is right out," Angus said wryly, planting his hands on his hips as he tried to reorganize his mental schedule.

Magnus began patting down his pants. "I think I have an heirloom pocket knife," he said.

"Didn't figure you for a mercenary," the cleric–Merle–said, raising a challenging eyebrow.

"Well, sir, I don't do a lot of pro bono work," Angus admitted. "I might be a little boy, but I still have bills. When I do volunteer my time, it's only for very good, very special cases. This is definitely one of those. Also," he added to Julia, "a tiny Neverwinter apartment is no place for a healing body."

She looked down, mouth a thin line.

"Jeez you're a dick," Merle muttered.

Angus ignored him. "I inherited a cottage not far outside of the city from an old friend and client," he said. "It's not much bigger than this, really, and I don't know what shape it's in. You'll probably still have to keep Taako in the living room. But the air is fresher, and you'll have plenty of access to fresh game and medicinal herbs."

The dwarf's eyebrows shot up. "Well," he said. "How about that. You're not so bad after all, for a human."

"That... that would be wonderful," Julia said, looking a little dazed. "When can we...?"

"Right now," Angus said, "if you have the time."

Both humans immediately scrambled to start packing. Merle stood at a more leisurely pace, stretching with a yawn before finally going over to Taako, checking his fever with an unhappy grimace before lifting the blankets to assess the rest of him. For the first time, Angus saw the elf's torso and arms.

Saw the cuffs.

Why would they leave the cuffs on him? Unless... Right, well, why  _would_ a fighter, ranger, and cleric have lock-picking skills?

"I'm no rogue," Angus said, stepping around Merle to look more closely at Taako's cuffs, "but lock-picking is a handy trick for a detective. Do you want me to take these off?"

After a long moment of silence, Julia swooped Angus into a strong hug. "Angus McDonald," she breathed into his hair. "You are a  _miracle."_

Once he got a handle on his blush, Angus removed Taako's cuffs, all four of them. Merle bandaged Taako's wrists and ankles, then declared him fit for travel. Once night fell, Angus led them to his cottage.

And then his investigation began.

 

Taako woke up.

Kind of.

Merle couldn't figure out what was wrong with him, but he just... sat in the window seat of the little cottage where they all lived now, not looking out the window, of course, but just. Setting his forehead on the glass and not doing much else. Totally vacant.

Julia and Magnus did their best, trying to get through to him. Taako responded to Magnus's voice but not his touch, Julia's touch but not her voice, and nothing Merle did basically ever. Even then,  _responded_ was kind of a strong word. At best he would almost turn toward them, but never quite. He would drink broth or thin soup and water, if they pressed it to his mouth, but wouldn't take the bowl or cup.

Taako let Merle clean his wounds, feel his bones, feed him potions, and that was all Merle really needed, so. The rest could come later. 

Eventually, Merle was able to unwind the bandages around Taako's eyes for the last time. The faint scarring was permanent, a splash of discolored skin running temple to temple. His golden eyes didn't look damaged, necessarily, but they had an odd haze to them. 

Magnus and Julia were worried. They wanted to spend all their time with Taako, tease him back up out of his mind, but none of them had the time for that. Magnus spent most of his day repairing the rustic but disused cabin. Before he left, Angus had given them blanket permission to make any changes they wanted, and Magnus already had a long list of projects. Julia left for the forest at sunrise and didn't usually get back until dark, laden with game and foraged nuts, berries, fruit, anything she could find that was in season. She and Magnus spent most of the early evening preparing the meat, which basically meant smoking it because not one of the three of them could actually cook. 

Merle spent more time with Taako than the other two combined, just through necessity. He didn't actually care if Taako sat and stewed about his fate. He couldn't sulk forever. Anyone who could escape a madman had too much will to just sit and rot. Merle didn't brush and clean and braid Taako's hair like Julia did, or tell him about a day of woodcarving or whatever it was like Magnus. 

Mostly, Merle talked to himself. He complained about difficult potions, bitched about how hard it was to turn certain plants into paste, scolded Taako for taking all his efforts for granted. When he was putting together new or experimental potions, he muttered about how this berry would interact with that root or whathaveyou.

In the end, that was what brought Taako back out of himself. Not Julia's comfort or Magnus's stories. It was Merle.

Getting a potion wrong.

He was trying to make a potion that would help with Taako's poor circulation, maybe help keep him a bit warmer. It shouldn't've been a big deal, just a dash of a few things and bam, toasty elf. He thought it came together pretty well. When he set it down on the little table by Taako's window seat, though, and turned away to get a spoon to pour it down that fool elf's throat, well.

Taako kicked it over. Just. Kicked. The whole pot of it to the ground. Nothing else about him changed. His arms stayed folded, he didn't lift his forehead. He kicked one foot out, hard, and ruined basically a whole day's work.

"You brat!" Merle shouted, rushing over to try and save even a little of it. He scooped the small pot off the ground, peering in to try and take stock. Not a total loss: there was about one serving left in the very–

Taako kicked again, sending the pot sailing over Merle's head and across the room, spilling every last drop.

Merle made inarticulate sounds of rage, not quite dumb enough to threaten Taako with physical harm, even if he would never actually go through with it. "You–! Why did you–!" He bent the spoon in his hands instead of flinging it at the blanket-clad elf.

Taako snugged down deeper in his nest until even his mouth was covered. "...Poison," he said, barely a breath of sound.

"What?" Merle blinked, looking down at the splash of potion across the floor. "No. I would never. Really?"

"Poison," Taako said again.

Well. Now wasn't that interesting.

Merle's skill in potion making took an abrupt, violent downturn. Not only did he combine terrible things in terrible ways, he made sure to wonder out loud about some  _seriously_ misguided ideas. A paste that would stick anything together forever for some of Taako's open wounds, eh? Or a brew that could attract animals to Julia instead of making her hunt for them, what'd'ya think about  _that?_  

He could  _see_ Taako trying not to care. Despite himself, the elf's limp shoulders started to bunch higher and higher toward ears twisted in Merle's direction. His mouth pressed into a pale, furious line. Under the blankets, one foot started to bounce.

"And then," Merle said, brewing chamomile tea while he pretended to make a sleeping aid, "I could add some nice mistletoe for spice–"

Taako's teeth made an audible sound as he grit them. He lurched out of his seat, turning to plant his feet on the ground. "You're going to get everybody  _killed,"_ he hissed.

"I don't see you doin' any better," Merle said, taking a sip of his tea.

"I don't see at  _all,"_ Taako snapped. "You inconsiderate half-sized  _lump_ of a dwarf!"

"Short jokes the best you can do?" Merle asked, watching Taako wobble to his feet, one hand on the wall for stability, keeping weight off his left ankle. "Elves don't actually have that much height on dwarves, y'know. As a species."

Taako drew in a deep breath, then started in on a diatribe against Merle's potions making skills that was, frankly, impressive. He'd paid attention to a lot, for a lot longer, than Merle had initially thought. By the end, he was out of breath, sagging against the wall, hair in his face and cheeks rosy with blood.

"Feel better?" Merle asked.

Taako didn't answer. Instead, he thrust his hand out. "Give me  _all_ of your thistle."

From then on, Merle made potions kind of as an extension of Taako. The elf told him what to chop, the colors to look for, how to mash and other basic shit like that. He made Merle, like, demonstrate the results, putting them where Taako could touch or smell them. Sometimes–way more often than was fair or reasonable–he made Merle start over. He was a  _terrible_ taskmaster, picky and fussy with a sharper tongue than he had any right to.

Merle argued back, of course. Sometimes he refused to re-dice a new root or leaf and squabbled with Taako straight through to the end of the healing potion or burn tonic or sleeping draught. For all that, Taako  _did_ make a better potion than Merle, even using someone else's hands to do it. And as long as Merle kept him in high dudgeon with fake (or not so fake) incompetence, he could press a bit of food or cup of liquid in his hands and get him to eat and drink on his own. He didn't like bread or water, so Merle gave him cheese, dried meat, juice or milk. It was a high-energy day, to be sure.

But it was also a good one.

When Magnus got back that evening, arms full of the chair he'd built especially for Taako, he stood in the doorway a long time watching them bicker. Then he burst into such loud, messy tears that Taako jumped a full foot into the air, scrambling to press into Merle's side. Well, to put Merle's body between him and the intruder, anyway.

"You silly shit!" Merle shouted at Magnus, annoyed by how much Taako's shaking hands were making his heart ache. "You scared him half to death!"

"Sorry!" Magnus yelped, putting the chair aside so he could make placating gestures. "Sorry, I was just–! I was so happy, I didn't even think–"

Merle yanked a small potions vial off his and Taako's workstation to shove it at the elf. "Drink," he ordered. When Taako hesitated, he snapped, "Drink!"

Taako drank. The calm emotions worked through him visibly, easing the hunch of his shoulders, the pinched expression, his sharp breathing, how he trembled in every limb. "I didn't need it," he muttered, shuffling back over to the window seat.

"You're welcome, you great big baby," Merle said.

"Wait!" Magnus said, hustling forward with the chair he'd made. "This is for you, Taako, it's–! Oh, you can't–" He set the chair down to scoot it across the room. It moved with barely a sound, legs capped with a material that let it slide over the wood floor like it was ice. "It's a chair, it's real easy to push around so you can put it wherever you want, if it gets boring in the window. And it–" He shoved at the back until the chair stretched out more like a chaise lounge. "It folds down so you can nap on it too. I just have to make some pillows for it and you should be good to go."

"I don't need a chair," Taako muttered sulkily, face turned away. 

Magnus slumped.

"Guess you'll just be standin' forever while we make those potions then," Merle said, arms crossed. "Seein' as we can't safely get the table any closer to the window than it is. Or you'll get tired and leave me to it on my own, suppose that's an option."

"It is  _not,"_ Taako snapped, twisting to glare... not quite at Merle, but close. He held out an imperious hand, head tilted back so he could give the impression of looking down his nose at them. "Well? Let me... _feel_  it, I guess."

Magnus's whole face lit with a grin. He swept the chair over to Taako to let him explore it with hesitant, light touches. "Hmm," he said at the end, pushing it away to sit in the window again. "You're right. Needs pillows." He crossed one leg over the other and turned pointedly to the window. "But I  _guess_ it'll do."

Magnus beamed and started crying again. A small noise drew their attention to the doorway where Julia was standing with a deer over her shoulder, also crying.

"Oh!" she exclaimed, voice thick with her tears. "He's really awake!"

"Is she crying  _too?"_  Taako snapped.

"Well, they're married," Merle said philosophically. 

"What does that have to do with anything!"

"I'm gonna make jerky," Julia sniffled. "Bear, do you wanna help me with the deer?"

Taako sat forward, ears lifted high. "You got a deer? Why would you make jerky, there is already a  _ton_ of jerky. Make stew or something, change it up a little!"

Magnus and Julia traded an uncertain look. "We, uh," she said sheepishly. "We... don't know how?"

The sound Taako made then was full of so much disgust that Merle accidentally laughed. Taako stabbed an accusing finger in about his direction. "You! You didn't tell me if we have, like, vegetables and shit. Tell me!"

"There's carrots," Julia said when Merle opened his mouth to tell the elf to fuck off. "Uh, I think we have potatoes? And maybe some... celery? I could find onions...?"

Taako sent them all off on food missions, gathering and chopping and boiling and preparing the meat. By the time it was done, they dug into the finest meal Merle had had in... Gods, he didn't even know how long.

"You're doing all our cooking from now on," Merle said around a chunk of tender meat.

Taako's ears snapped flat. He set his bowl on the very edge of the table. "I didn't cook it," he said lightly. "Right? You cooked it. I just... I just told you when to throw what in. But I didn't cook it."

"Course you did, buddy," Magnus said comfortingly before Julia could slap his arm.

"Don't," Merle hissed, but it was too late. Taako folded in on himself, hands tucked under his arms, shying away from his mostly-full bowl.

"It's okay," Julia said softly, reaching out to touch his arm.

Taako flinched so hard he knocked his bowl to the ground. He fled, stumbling back over to the window seat, and curled up with his head hidden in his arms, trembling. 

"I've been workin' on something for this," Merle said, lifting his hand. He channeled all his power to cast his first ever second level spell: Calm Emotions. Taako's shaking stopped, but he didn't come out of his huddle. Damn. "Ix-nay on the ooking-cay," he muttered to the others. "Let's give him some space, finish our food. We've got time to figure it out."

After dinner and cleanup, Magnus went over to Taako, walking heavy so the elf could hear him. He sat near Taako's feet but not so close that touching could be accidental. "I'm sorry," the fighter said, sounding wretched. "I don't know what I did or why it hurt you, but I'm sorry for it."

Taako didn't respond.

"Can you tell me what I did?" Magnus asked, soft and pleading. "If you tell me, I can avoid it in the future. I don't want to be the one who hurts you more than you already are, Taako."

After a long silence, Taako uncurled, just a little. "I used to cook a lot," he said, voice no stronger than a whisper. "It was... it was fun, and easy, and I was good at it. But something went wrong. Bad. I... I fucked up, I was so  _stupid,_ and now I'm... _this_. I hurt a lot of people. I hurt them when I could  _see,_ and I can't... I could do something worse and never even know it."

"Julia's a ranger," Magnus said. "She knows the good plants and the bad ones better than anybody. And she's got the sharpest eyes ever. She won't let you hurt us."

Taako lifted his head. His face was wet with tears, his eyes huge and blank. Something in his expression made Merle's heart sting. "Promise?" he whispered.

Magnus nodded, then shook his head, looking frustrated with himself. "I promise," he said as firmly as he could. He lifted one hand. "Can I touch your face? You've got hair sticking to it."

After a few tense heartbeats, Taako nodded sharply, leaning forward. Magnus pulled Taako's hair back carefully, then lifted a corner of the blanket to wipe his tears. "You were alone, I think," the fighter said in a low voice. "That's how he got you. Because you were alone. But you're not anymore. You've got us, and we won't let you hurt anyone, not even yourself. We won't let anyone hurt  _you,_  either. We're in this together now, Taako."

Together, Merle thought, as resigned as he was amused by it. 

Hell. There were worse fates.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think next time we meet Pam! Or the time after that. Soon, though! I think you'll like Pam, she went over well with test audiences :D Also either next time or the time after we're doing Rockport Limited. BUCKLE IN CHILDREN


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A huge thanks as usual (even though I always forget to say it) to Hawk, my fabulous beta reader, without whom none of this would be possible. You're the greatest, Hawk!

Taako's eyes didn't get better. Everything else healed, pretty much. His ankle continued to be a little touchy, and he still had a real big chip on his shoulder about bread, but... He got better. 

He tried not to think about all the stuff he'd never do again. The things he'd never see. It didn't help to think about it, and also his annoying new groupies could usually tell when he was dwelling. They had each developed a way to harass him out of any funks, which was just. Awful.

A week or so after Merle first enticed him back to brewing via sheer incompetence, a little boy who called himself a detective showed up. Angus McDonald. Apparently they were living in a cottage now, and it belonged to the pipsqueak, who didn't sound a day over, like. Young. For a human. Basically a baby.

_How_ was he a detective? The world's  _greatest_ detective, humble-bragging little shit. Did he have, like, an older relative or something who was  _actually_  a detective, and he was just here playing make-believe?

While Taako was draped over his Magnus chair sulking about it, the boy wonder encouraged the rest of Taako's entourage to be anywhere other than in the cabin. Something dark coiled in Taako's stomach as the last of them left, something Taako hated and couldn't seem to do anything about. He felt his muscles tensing as Merle–sounding annoyed and strangely reluctant–closed the door behind him. Leaving Taako and the boy alone.

Taako's breathing hitched.

"Oh dear," said the boy. "That was kind of stupid of me, huh, sir? Hold on, okay?" He got up, and Taako tried not to flinch but he just– The boy opened the front door. "Magnus!" he called. "Do you think maybe now would be a good time to work on the roof, instead? And, excuse me, Merle, but on second thought you were absolutely right. This is the optimal daylight to work on your garden. My mistake!"

Taako felt his lower lip wobble and ducked his head, hating himself and the wave of relief that swept through him at the sound of Magnus clambering onto the roof, Merle complaining vociferously from the direction of the windows. He didn't need those fucking guys. They weren't some kind of  _security blanket._

The boy took his seat again, continuing to pretend that Magnus and Merle just  _happened_ to have nearby chores that were the most important thing right now. They both ignored the way Taako's tension slowly bled back down to baseline. "Now," Angus said with a rustling sound like maybe he was flipping open a little notebook.  _Nerd._  "I've conducted a few preliminary interviews with some of the residents of Glamour Springs–"

Taako was moving before he could even think about it, flailing halfway across the room to huddle back in his window seat. Merle's complaining quieted for only a moment before redoubling. The dwarf cursed about soil, seeds, water, rain, sun, wind, and his own shoes before Taako realized that the ringing in his ears was slowly fading. That was when he became aware that his ears had been ringing at all, and he scowled at himself. "You can't...you can't just kidnap me," he snapped. "The... These chucklefucks won't let you. Magnus promised, he–"

"Ah  _beans,"_  the child said, sounding frustrated. "I don't usually– Most of the people I work with aren't the direct– Sorry, sir!" he finally blurted, sounding the same distance away he had at the beginning. He hadn't... he hadn't gotten up, apparently, had just kept sitting there while Taako flipped out like an idiot. "I should be more considerate in how I phrase things."

"I don't need your consideration," Taako spat. "I'm  _fine."_

"Yes, sir, I know it, I just meant this isn't the type of case I usually take on, and I seem to be flubbing it."

Taako breathed deep for a minute or so, matching the working of his lungs to the rhythm of Magnus tapping nails into the roof. "What do you mean," he said at last, "this isn't your usual case?"

"...I don't know how to phrase it," Angus admitted. 

"Just spit it out!"

"I solve a lot of murders," he said immediately, "and a lot of thefts. This is more of a... Well, to be frank, sir, it's shaking out like a frame job that turned into a series of Sapient Rights violations."

"A frame job," Taako whispered, heart hammering in his ears. "No, I... It wasn't like that. I–"

"That's why I'm here," the boy said, underscored by a tapping sound like the tip of a pencil against paper. "I was very discreet in G– er. In town. It's a very, uh. Gossipy place, which worked out well for me. I heard all about...what happened."

"You mean how I poisoned and killed forty people during a cooking show by being  _fucking_ flashy when I should have been paying some gods-damned attention?"

"That's just it," Angus said. His chair made an awful sound when he scooted it just a bit forward. "Sir, I heard what meal you were making, and I can't figure a way for you to accidentally turn anything in that to anything that would have arsenic in it. So I don't think–"

"Arsenic?" Taako felt like his skin was tingling, like his head would just float away. His whole dark world tilted as he slumped against the wall. "You're a shitty detective if– It was the elderberries. I turned them...I turned them into deadly nightshade, I must have, I thought about it for  _weeks_ and the only way–"

"Excuse me, sir," Angus interrupted firmly. "But no. I read the autopsies thoroughly, and was able to procure some samples of my own to test. It's entirely conclusive. The forty people died of arsenic poisoning. And, again, I don't see how that could have been you."

Taako kind of...he kind of fuzzed out for a minute. He came to at the scent of something awful, gods-damned smelling salts or something, shoved under his nose. The kid still sounded like he was at the far table so–

"Back with us?" Merle asked, from the direction of the window, which he must have climbed through to be so close. He must look  _hilarious._

"It wasn't me," Taako said, one hand snapping out to grab Merle's wrist. "I didn't transmute arsenic, I transmuted– _fuck,_ I transmuted  _elderberries,_ holy fuck I didn't, I, Merle, I didn't–"

"Taking that as a no," Merle said mildly. 

Magnus jumped off the roof to climb in after Merle, squishing close to Taako, who huddled into his side like Magnus was a shield. He could feel how wide his eyes were, how hard he was shaking. The wetness on his cheeks meant he was  _crying_ ,fuck,  _again. "_ I didn't kill them," he said, throat feeling raw and hoarse, like he'd been screaming. But he hadn't been screaming, he'd just. Fuck. "I didn't kill them," he said again.

"I know," Magnus said, his conviction finally spilling over into Taako. 

"Since you didn't," Angus agreed, still at the table, still pretending Taako wasn't a fucking  _wreck_  of a person, "someone else had to. Who would frame you for murder, Taako? Who really killed the people of Glamour Springs?"

Taako's heart-rate spiked. How could he possibly know something like–

Well, but who had access to the food before it went out? Who had a grudge, who would throw him under a bus this size? Who else, really?

"Sazed," he said, voice cracking halfway through the name. "Sazed, he was my assistant, he wanted to be more but I– It was my show and I didn't want to share it and he murdered  _forty people_ for it?" He laughed, aware that he was taking a hard turn into hysteria and not sure what he could do about it. So he just. He tipped his head back against Magnus's shoulder and laughed and laughed until the laughter turned into screaming, at last, and sobbing that he could do  _nothing_ about. Magnus held him in that paradoxical way of his, simultaneously snugging him tight and giving him a sense of space and freedom and a dozen exits if he wanted them.

Merle wrapped a gentle hand around his bad ankle, washing Calm Emotions over him. Taako thought maybe he should fight it, maybe he should try and pull himself together and help Angus McDonald, World's Greatest Detective, nail Sazed to the fucking wall.

He also thought, passionate and sincere,  _fuck it._

And that was the thought that won out.

When he woke back up, Angus was gone. His first thought, as usual, was  _oh, it's dark out._  But no, it was just always dark now, and he could feel the sun warming his skin. The window seat faced full west, so it was sometime after noon but before sunset, he'd guess around threeish. Merle was cursing in the garden. Magnus was tapping away on the roof. He got a noseful of the particular scent that meant Julia had acquired and was cleaning meat for dinner. He couldn't tell what kind, yet, but he was sure he would, in time. The other senses were supposed to get stronger when one went away, right?

Someone had laid a cool wet cloth over his eyes. Ugh, because he'd had yet another breakdown. Awesome. Taako considered getting up, but...

Well, he was comfortable. He was surrounded by people he could, like. Trust, or whatever. And he was not a murderer.

So for a while, he just sat there, mind comfortably numb, not even bothering to think. Eventually he couldn't help himself, couldn't stop the slow, swelling sense of purpose growing in his heart. He let it rise like the sun, like the stars and moon, inevitable and merciless.

He would kill Sazed. He would kill Kalen. He would see the entire town of Glamour Springs ruined. And he would do it under his own power.

There was no more time to sit around thinking about who he had been and what he could have done. Every bit of his will would now work toward his goal, toward mastering magic and potions and anything else he had to, vision or no vision. They had done this to him because they thought he had blood on his hands, well. Fine.

Then he would get blood on his hands. He would become that monster. 

Making potions, like cooking or baking, was a matter of knowing which ingredients did what together, and then getting creative. He didn't need vision for that, just a method for determining the items at hand. Okay, so, that was a matter of memorization. And there were spells for seeing arcane energy that didn't actually  _need_ eyes. Sure, seeing people  _interpreted_ the spell through vision, but it wasn't necessary. It might...take a while, to get to level five and access the actual spell, but surely there were workarounds. Runes, maybe, or sigils, that he could apply to an object and turn that object into a functioning Arcane Sight cheat. Or something.

The point was, magic put off a field, and if Taako could figure out how to sense it, that was half his problems solved. Wizards didn't need to see. Nobody really  _needed_ to see. Taako would get his own back from Glamour Springs, from Kalen, from Sazed, no matter what it took.

Step one: Dinner.

 

Figuring out he wasn't actually a mass murderer seemed to do Taako a world of good. Even that first night, he shuffled over to Julia and asked if he could help with dinner, for the first time ever.

Okay, technically, "asked" was kind of a generous way of phrasing what happened. Taako crowded in close by her and then demanded to be given a knife. Julia gave him one, over Merle's strenuous protests, and Taako got to chopping. He had good muscle memory for it–which made sense, given his background as a chef and some kind of apprentice potions master–and didn't nick himself so much as one time. It took him longer to do the chopping than he seemed to like, and he got real frustrated when his hands shook too hard to measure some of the ingredients, but the effort it took, the will, was admirable. Julia figured out pretty quick that if she pretended like she wanted Taako to teach her how to cook, he'd let her kind of help him out with some of the trickier steps. Plus it kept his mind off the memories trying to take him away.

Also, Julia did actually want to learn how to cook. So it was kind of a win/win for her.

Within a few days, Taako had figured out most of the kitchen. He got everything right where he wanted it and threw a fit if any of them moved anything by so much as an inch. 

During the day, he oscillated between harassing Merle to help him identify plants by touch, scent, sometimes taste, and utterly ignoring him. Taako got into the habit of pushing his Magnus chair out into the morning sunlight so he could perch on the cushions and mediate with this or that item in his hands. Only the ones with magical properties, though. 

"What're you doing?" Julia asked the first time she stumbled upon Taako sitting in the sun with a magic suppressing cuff cradled in his hands.

One of Taako's long ears flicked in her direction and his forehead creased in a frown, but he didn't open his eyes. "I'm  _trying_ to meditate," he said waspishly.

"Yeah I figured, but...why the cuff?"

Taako turned to nearly face her, frown blossoming into a full scowl. "There's almost  _nothing_  in this place with actual arcane energy on it. If I'm going to figure out how to detect it without vision, I need to start practicing now." He hefted the cuff. "This piece of shit's my only option, so here we are."

Julia drummed her fingers on the back of Taako's chair thoughtfully. "What if I could get you some plants with magical properties? Would that be better?"

" _Fuck_  yes, I hate this thing."

After that, it became nearly a game, seeing who could find magical items for Taako to practice on. Julia started by just handing him her discoveries, but as soon as Magnus and Merle caught on, they took to hiding them around the cottage and eventually the surrounding gardens, seeing how long it took Taako to find them.

He got real good at it scary fast. Never was quite able to see them, or get a visual-like impression, but he picked up on the sense of them almost immediately. One day Julia came back home to find him scratching runes into the glass of an old pair of spectacles, something that seemed like it shouldn't be possible to do. It was like he could see what he was doing.

"The runes leave the sensation of an afterimage," Taako said without picking up his head. "Not for a long time, but enough to finish the easy ones. I'll have to figure out something more long-term for the complicated ones." He tapped his little scratching tool on the glasses. "Don't ever tell me how ugly these are."

Julia didn't, but Merle did. He basically refused to let Taako ever put the glasses on without immediately showing up to rag him for how ugly they were. Magnus laughed but didn't actively join in. Julia rolled her eyes but didn't stop them.

Angus showed up a few more times, first with just news that he had a few promising leads, then with a huge stack of books on braille that he braved giving to Taako, and finally with an elegant pair of glasses with wide, metals arms perfect for holding runic inscriptions. Taako treated Angus the way Merle treated him–half project, half game–but he did let Angus sit closer on each visit. He stopped flinching when Angus brushed his arm. He explained what he was doing, and why, the theory behind it, and rolled his eyes when Angus made a series of awed noises.

"That's artificing!" the detective exclaimed. "I had no idea you were an artificer, sir!"

Taako hesitated, lifting his head away from his latest project–a series of sigils on the cane Magnus made him so maybe he'd hate it a little less–to frown in Angus's direction. "Artificing?" he echoed. "What in the hell's that?"

Angus practically vibrated out the door, returning the next day with an enormous stack of books. "There's not a lot available in braille," he said, sounding like he took it as a personal failing, "but there's a spell you can use so it'll read the text to you. You can even have it read straight into your mind!"

"Ew," Taako said, rubbing a bit of elderflower paste between his fingers to judge the texture. "Invasive. Anyway, what's the spell?"

Taako's knack for artificing combined with his hard-earned skill at potions meant he had plenty to keep him busy. But as his competency increased, so did his need for ever rarer materials. Julia stopped being able to find them in the forest.

They ran out of money.

Magnus, on a trip into town to try and sell some of his carvings, ran into Craig the gnome. He brought back a job offer, a simple escort quest that the three of them should be able to manage no problem and would pay so handsomely they'd never have to go without again. It seemed like serendipity, the perfect opportunity at just the right time. Angus came for a visit the same day, solving the last problem of  _who will watch Taako._

Taako didn't want them to go. He didn't say as much–Taako admitting he wanted any of them around would be a surer sign of the apocalypse than anything else–but they knew him, by now. They could all see how snappy he got, from impatient and furious to sulking and quiet in the blink of an eye. He would never directly ask them to stay–likely couldn't, just based on who he was as a person–which meant they never had to tell him no.

Julia gave Taako a Stone of Farspeech before they left, tuned to the matching stone around her own neck. For a moment, she thought he would throw it right out the window. In the end, though, he settled for turning away from her, stone gripped tight in one hand.

When they left, Julia made the mistake of glancing back. Taako was in the window seat, curled around a pillow from the Magnus chair, face pressed hard into the fluff. Angus sat by him with an enormous book in his lap, reading from a section about halfway through. Julia's heart ached. They would be okay, though. It was just a few days.

Everything was going to be fine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I counted wrong, no Pam this time. Next time, though! I think! Probably??


	5. Chapter 5

"Man," Magnus said when Merle's cousin collapsed to the ground in an exhausted faint, "am I glad you learned Calm Emotions so we could stop him before he got to town."

Merle trotted over to Gundren with a shrug. "Don't tell the elf," he warned the other two while tugging the doom gauntlet off his snoozing relative. "If he knows he was useful, we'll never hear the end of it." Once the gauntlet was freed, he tossed it to Magnus and started with some healing spells.

"That was amazing," Killian said, lowering her crossbow with a look of surprise. "I was sure we'd have to kill him."

"Yeah, well done," Barry Bluejeans echoed. He eyed the umbrella hooked over Julia's wrist. "...Hey, uh. Can I have that?" He squirmed when they all turned to him. "It's, uh. It seems to have some magical properties? And I, uh, know some magic."

"We know a guy who knows some magic too," Merle said.

Magnus shrugged. "I made him that cool cane already, though, I don't think he'll need an umbrella too."

"Aw, bear." Julia patted Magnus's arm. "He hates that cane with every fiber of his being."

"Sure but like,  _symbolically_ he hates it, on merit alone I bet he thinks it's great."

"So can I have that? The umbrella? It feels important," Barry admitted. "Having the umbrella. I won't take it, or anything! But. If you'd give it to me, that'd be great."

Julia yelped and dropped the umbrella in question. "It shocked me," she said, rubbing her wrist. She nudged it toward Barry with the toe of one boot. "If it hates Merle and it hates me, you might as well take it. There's no telling if it'll hate– Uh, y'know, my buddy. You can have it."

Barry scooped up the umbrella with an expression of confused relief. "Thanks," he said. "I don't...I don't know why I need it. But I do. So. Thank you."

Merle flapped one hand through the air. "S'long as we get paid, I'm not really that invested in your weather gear."

"Hey, yeah!" Magnus turned to Gundren's prone body. "Do you figure he actually has money, or was he just planning to pay us with whatever we found in the vault?"

"He'd better pay us," Julia said, flexing her hands on her bow. "We have a contract. And I really wanted to get– Uh." She glanced at the strangers around them. "...Y'know. Our friend. I wanted to get him a surprise."

"Do you want this?" Magnus asked Killian, holding out the gauntlet. "You said you were here to get it, right?"

She started forward, arm outstretched, something manic in her eyes, then shuddered hard and backed way up. "Aw, shit," she muttered, mostly to herself. "I have to go." And then she ran away. Just.

Back toward the caves, while pressing hard on her silver bracer.

"Weird," Magnus and Julia chimed. 

Magnus turned to Barry. "Do you have a place to stay?" he asked. 

Barry blinked at him. "Uh."

"Sometimes people who pick up jobs like this don't," the fighter continued, "and you seem like a good guy. You can come with us?"

"Is that smart?" Merle demanded, finally turning away from his cousin. "We got the–! Y' _know."_

"Barry's a good guy," Magnus insisted. "I'm sure he'd be just fine with..." He glanced at Barry. "Y'know."

Julia laughed, then immediately covered her mouth. "Sorry," she giggled. "This is just... We're so bad at this! We should try and stay at the–" She bent over laughing. "The you know!"

Barry looked confused but also a little charmed. "It's okay," he said. "I have a place of my own, it's not too far from here. Hey, why don't you guys split my portion of the payment? It sounds like you might need it more than I do." He hefted the umbrella with a grin. "This'll be my take."

"Aw, Barry," Magnus said with a grin. "See? A good guy."

After that, Barry made his excuses and left, while Merle and his loser buddies had to wait for Gundren to wake up. They dragged him a little further away from town, mostly to get the gauntlet away, too. If it could make a reasonable dwarf like his cousin go off the deep end, who else could it fuck with? Killian seemed more competent than the rest of them put together, and even she wouldn't take the stupid thing.

Before Gundren regained consciousness, a huge glass floating...sphere thing landed. A door opened, and from inside a voice spoke, elegant and poised. "Please step inside the sphere with the gauntlet. We will transport it and you to a safe location."

Merle and the others traded uncertain looks.

"Uh," Magnus said eventually, "sorry, can't...? We kind of have another thing we gotta do. But thanks, I guess? You...want me to put the gauntlet in here by itself, or...?"

After a surprised silence, the voice said, "I can offer you a job, if you bring the gauntlet to me."

Magnus tossed the gauntlet into the sphere. "Okay, bye!"

"Is he planning to take much longer, do you think?" Julia asked Merle.

Merle shrugged as expressively as he could. "I figured he'd be up way before this!"

"I still want to talk to him about that orc-hating thing," Magnus said stubbornly. "There's nothing wrong with orcs!"

"We need to get back soon," Julia stressed. "You know, uh,  _y'know_  doesn't do great when we're gone anyway."

"He's got nudge-nudge with him," Merle said without bothering to nudge anyone. "He'll be fine."

"...Will he?" Magnus asked, starting to sound worried.

"This job pays quite well," the sphere said.

"We're not actually in the job market," Magnus told it. "Does he have any coins on him right now," he added to Merle, "'cause, like, we could just take those and go, and I'll send him a strongly-worded anti-racist message later."

"I can give you a large number of coins if you bring me that gauntlet."

"This is starting to sound like a trap," Julia said to the sphere.

"It's not," the sphere promised. "I'm interested in your ability to withstand the thrall of the  ~~Grand Relics~~. I don't have anyone else on my staff, currently, who's been able to show similar restraint. I will reward you quite well if you will see this task through to its end, better than Gundren Rockseeker would, and then send you home afterward if you continue to insist on it."

"Very trap-y," Julia reiterated. 

Merle squinted at his cousin. "This might take a while," he said at last. "And there's no guarantee he  _wasn't_ planning to pay us from the vault. I say, if we really want to get  _y'know_  funds, we put Gundren in the inn, take the ball, and see what happens."

"That's a gamble," Julia said.

"It's a gamble either way," Merle pointed out. "If the ball falls through, we can always come back to Gundren, shake him down a bit."

"They're gonna try and sell us timeshares," Julia sighed, leading the way into the glass sphere. "I just know it."

They did  _not_ try to sell timeshares, which was good. Less good:  _they_ were, apparently, some kind of secret fake moon society hunting down a series of static-sounding objects for the good of Faerun, or whatever. The voice came from a tall, stately woman everyone called the Director.

And, damn it, the whole thing  _was_ a job pitch.

"Pass," Merle said basically as soon as the Director stopped talking.

She blinked at him. "Surely you understand how important this is," she said.

"We already have something important," Magnus told her, whole body set in stubborn lines. "Maybe we can set up a freelance thing but we're not available to accept job offers right now. Not from you. Not from anyone."

"That gauntlet is destroyed," Julia said, shifting up beside Magnus in a defensive position. "Are you going to pay us and let us go, or was this a bad choice for us to make? And by 'this', I want you to know I mean  _trusting you."_

The Director looked torn. "We really need your help," she said.

"We're already helping somewhere else," Magnus said. "So, like, I'm not sure how to explain to you that freelance is the best you can hope for from us. We're already running late."

"Think of this like an extended trust fall," Julia said. "You can pay us like you promised and send us back down to Faerun, and that means you caught us the way we hoped you would. We'll give you our Stone of Farspeech frequency, and maybe you call us when you need more help, and we'll show up, and that'll be us catching you. But we have other obligations, and we're not staying here. We'll jump off this moon if we have to."

"Well now that's a touch dramatic," Merle said.

"We so will," Magnus insisted.

The Director seemed to deflate, just a little. "Very well," she said. She turned to her gnome butler, who, somewhat creepily, could only say his own name. "Davenport, please bring them their pay."

"Davenport," the gnome agreed, carrying over a large silver tray. 

They got their money, they attuned their Stones of Farspeech, Magnus realized they had fantasy gashapon tokens and hustled them away to use them. And  _then_ they took another big glass ball back down to the surface. The flight guy, Avi, told them he'd send them directly back to their house, but, uh, not one of them was born yesterday.

"Back to Phandalin," Merle insisted. "We still gotta collect from my cousin, too."

By the time they got down there, though, Gundren had vanished. "He's gonna hear about this the next time I see him," Merle muttered as they packed up their wagon to head back home.

"I still need his address for that stern letter," Magnus said.

When they got home, they discovered that Taako had exacted his revenge against them for leaving him behind by turning basically the whole cottage into one huge crazy wizard workshop. There were bubbling cauldrons and strings of cloth and crystal hanging from the ceiling. Runes and sigils that nobody else could read had been etched in the walls, on the floor, the furniture. His books were stacked in every corner, organized in some way that made absolutely no sense to Merle when he glanced at them.

And he'd managed to enlist Angus into his service somehow. The boy was even now drawing slow, careful lines across the floor with an enormous piece of chalk. 

He'd done this to them in, like. Three days.

What the fuck.

"I'm just gonna tear this all down," Merle said, refusing to step out of the doorway. Julia was sidling carefully toward the kitchen while Magnus picked his way to the bedrooms.

Taako, sitting cross-legged at the table with those weirdo glasses on while he cut another rune into a piece of leather, ignored them.

"He left our rooms alone," Magnus called back to him. "So, I mean, he sleeps in the window, right? It's kind of like he just upgraded his bedroom."

"I think the kitchen's possessed," Julia said.

"Not at all, ma'am!" Angus chirped. "Taako's working on some potions and has been testing them on cutlery."

"Hope nobody needs a spoon," Taako added.

"Well I don't now," Julia said, creeping back into the living room to sit gingerly at the table. "I might not ever again."

"...What're they doin'?" Merle asked suspiciously. 

"You don't want to know," Julia, Taako, and Angus chorused together.

Julia dug into her bag. "I got something for you," she said, waiting for Taako to hold out his hand before placing a small bag in it. She opened her mouth to describe it, but Taako shook his head.

"I'll never learn that way," he said, hefting the bag. "Is any of it particularly breakable?"

"I don't think so."

"Good." He immediately up-ended the bag and started to explore its contents with a curious tilt to his head. Angus got up to sidle in beside Taako, looking over his shoulder with wide eyes as Taako began to sort the various spell components that Julia had gotten him. Like the books, there didn't seem to be any particular rhyme or reason to the piles he made, but they satisfied Taako and that was good enough.

"I'm gonna make a bomb," he announced.

There was a great silence followed by an even greater, clamoring commotion. Merle gave up on everybody he knew and went outside to tend his garden.

At least the plants really got him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No Pam again. NEXT TIME. Almost for sure! I forgot how late in the story she shows up, oops
> 
> And hey! Look who's got Lup! Wonder how that'll work out *aggressive shoulder shimmy*


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PAAAAAAM.
> 
> Huge shout-out to the Amazing Hawk, who beta'd this for me AT WORK so I could get it up! You're the BEST

Barry Bluejeans had a coin. The coin knew him, said it  _was_ him, a him he couldn't remember. It told him about himself, things that nobody else knew. And it told him about the great love of his life. A love that defined and redeemed him. The ache in his heart, that emptiness it described, was real.

If that love was real, too, he would do anything in the world to find it. To find her.

To that end, Barry did what the coin said. He went places and met people. Collected items, lived in a weird-ass cave with a huge body-growing thing that upset him, but not enough to abandon his eternal quest. They were looking for his love, him and this coin. This other him.

Barry wasn't sure how the coin worked. It didn't list off directions and then fall silent. It seemed to be triggered by events, somehow. When he first picked it up, it gave him the speech about who he was, who  _it_ was, a first command. When he accomplished that task, it told him the next thing to do. He followed its directions and ended up with Rockseeker, kidnapped by gerblins, nearly dead, and with nothing but an umbrella to show for it at the end. 

Then he got back to his cave, and the coin activated again. It told him to break the umbrella.

For the first time in a long time, Barry hesitated. The umbrella was clearly magical, and clearly powerful. Why should he break it?

The coin knew him. It understood the pain in his chest, the emptiness, and it was trying to get him back to the one person in the world who could make that ache stop.

Barry broke the umbrella.

Immediately, the whole cave was filled with fire and smoke, red lightning and a terrifying power Barry had never known the likes of. A figure rose from the umbrella, clad all in red, phantasmal and resplendent. A ghost, maybe, or...fuck, what was worse than ghosts? A wraith?

The figure made his heart sing. He didn't–didn't know  _why_ but looking at it, wreathed in fire, arms outstretched, face obscured by that red robe, he just–

Gods, she made him  _ache._

Once the lightshow was done, the figure looked around, seeming to be confused. It set eyes on him. "...Barry?" it whispered in a low, warm woman's voice. "Barry Bluejeans, you clever man, you  _found_ me!" She swooped down to him, flinging her arms around his neck even though they just went right thought him. If he looked hard into the hood, he could almost make out the shape of a face, lovely, not familiar but– "As soon as I get my body back, I'm gonna smooch the fuck outta you."

Barry's heart raced in his chest. "Who...who are you?" he asked, voice croaking with nerves.

The figure jerked back. "What? What do you– Oh  _fuck_ the  ~~voidfish~~. What were you thinking, Lucretia! Never mind, we'll figure it out later." She set her spectral hands on his shoulders, so carefully, making sure they didn't drift through. "Babe, listen to me. I'm Lup, okay? I'm  _your_ Lup, and you're my Barry, and we're going to figure this out. You're the smartest lich in Faerun. You've  _got_ to have a plan already set up."

"I'm a what?" he croaked. 

Lup leaned forward to brush her ghostly nose against his, sending a chill of...something powerful but not  _bad_ up his spine. "You're a lich, babe, same as me. You've been in the cave a while, huh? I can tell how hard you've been working. And all alone, too, I bet. Well, not anymore. I'm back, and I'm not leaving you again. We're going to figure out what's going on, get some  ~~voidfish~~  juice so you can hear me say  ~~voidfish~~ , then we're gonna find our family and save the world, preferably before  ~~the Hunger~~  gets here."

The coin Barry had set on the table crackled to life. "Lup," it said in his voice, sounding absolutely wrecked, thick with tears and desperation. "Lup, god, if you're hearing this, if you've activated this part of the recording, I did it. I found you. You're in the Umbra Staff, I know it, and I finally found it, you're  _free._ Listen, kill me. Kill me so I can hug you and– We'll figure out bodies later, I have a whole– There's a thing and I made notes  _please_ kill me so I know you, Lup. I missed you and I love you. Lucretia's on the moon; I think there are two  ~~voidfish~~ , Lup. You have to find both of them. But I'll tell you all about it myself if you just kill me,  _please_ Lup. I love you so, so much. Gods, I can't believe I finally  _found you."_

The recording cut off, and Barry turned to Lup, not so much scared as  _real nervous._  "...Are you, uh. Are you gonna–?"

Lup scrubbed her nose against Barry's again. "You're a huge sap," she said, love and humor bubbling under the words. "Of course I'm not gonna kill you." She laughed, and Barry chuckled along with her, weak with relief. "What a waste of a good body!" Her spectral hand slid over his butt. "I've got plans for this, buddy, you better believe it. Now!" She floated away, over toward the huge ominous tank Barry usually did his best to ignore. "Let's figure this out so we can get a hot bod cooking for me, too. And then I guess we're going to the moon!"

Barry, flushed and flustered, trailed after her, feeling more like a besotted puppy than a full grown man. That was okay, though. He could already feel that broken piece of him mending, and knew he'd do whatever he had to just to keep Lup near and happy. 

Make a body, go to the moon?

Plan.

 

Life in the cottage settled into a normal routine. Well, insofar as a bunch of weirdos in a conspiracy of hiding a blind, innocent elf from the world's biggest sadistic asshole could ever be  _normal_ or  _routine,_ anyway.

Taako got used to it. 

No, fuck that, what Taako got was  _awesome_ at it. He had the whole cottage set up just the way he liked it, with lines of magic and anchor runes throughout so he could...it wasn't seeing. That was done, over, a thing of the past. So last year. But he could  _feel_ where things were now, a resonance or gap based on how the item interacted with the constant magical hum he'd set up. None of the others could feel it, which was whatever. He didn't need them. Boy Wonder tried, sometimes, but could only kind of maybe pick up a sense that probably something was happening.

Taako had big plans for his field. It wasn't mobile–too complicated for that–but he thought he almost had a way to capture the idea of it in a bubble around him that would help with not, like, tripping over rocks in the forest. The problem was he needed to test it more, and really the only way to do that was to go outside. Outside was...not his favorite. His chair wasn't outside, or his books, or any of the pillows he'd stolen over the past few months. It was hot or cold or sunny or windy. Never just right. Outside, psh, who even needed it.

Well. His traveling system did. For practice. Taako never took off the simple–probably hideous–bits of metal he'd scratched his hypothetical personal portable magical leyline field into, just in case. The earrings connected specially to the necklace, which hooked up with the rings, which bounced off anklets, and if he lost any one piece he'd have to basically start all over. Maybe someday he'd make them prettier, for the theoretical aesthetic, but for right now simple was what he had. The jewelry, all linked together, put off a localized magical frequency much closer to his skin than the cottage's, which meant he could carry it with him. Now the trick was extending the effect when he was outside so he could, like. Detect uneven ground, or passing squirrels, or maybe even eventually an attack or something. If he could train it, train himself in the use of it, he might even get to the point where people couldn't even tell he couldn't see their ugly faces.

So Taako  _had_ to go outside. He had to. The system needed training. At first he tried just, like, sidling around the perimeter of the cottage, making his goal simple: step on as many of Merle's plants as he could, and nothing else. He could judge his success by how aggressively Merle cursed at him. 

Unfortunately, the internal magical field of the cottage kind of...looked for him? It stretched outside its intended confines to include the gardens and about, eh, five hundred feet across the surrounding meadow. So. 

Had to be the forest.

Magnus would probably take him, but Magnus was boisterous enough to chase off a lot of the local wildlife. If he wanted to see if he could pick up on small life signs, he needed someone quiet. 

He needed Julia.

But she– It was– Julia usually had to keep an eye out for deer or whatever, edible plants, she wouldn't want– Taako wasn't a  _burden,_ but–

One morning, Julia swooped over to Taako where he was guessing how long a jump it'd be to really stomp on a fantasy begonia, taking his hand and tucking it into the bend of her arm. "Come on," she said, leading him away from his game. "Merle's garden has suffered enough, I think. Let's go hop on a toadstool or something in the woods before he genuinely does a murder."

Taako's heart gave a hard thump. It was...kind of nice of her to– But, like, whatever, she probably just wanted the company anyway.

Every day, from then on, Julia saved Merle's garden by taking Taako on a morning walk. They started out real slow, real short, and exhausted Taako so much that he hated it. Hated how tense his muscles were, how his field pinged on things as planned but he didn't know what it meant, or couldn't figure it out in time, hated how often he tripped and fell, how easy it was to hurt his stupid fucking ankle.

Julia never said anything about it. Or, actually, she chatted a lot to Magnus about how much fun they'd had, what they'd seen, the growing strength of Taako's magical field. She didn't bring attention to any of the scrapes or bruises Taako picked up, or the way they always had to wrap and ice that same ankle. She kept the whole thing impossibly, disgustingly positive.

They kept walking. After a few months, Taako stopped picking up injuries. He stopped tripping. Not because he was used to the path–Julia switched it up all the time–but because his system was  _working._  It wasn't perfect, but it was enough, and Taako was about to have his new vision-less world on  _lock._

And then one day, while Taako was specifically testing the system against life signs, he found something...interesting. Something maybe good.

Something for Julia.

He waited a whole day just to be sure. Then he caught Julia mid-step and yanked her right off the path. She followed him with a sputter, locking her arm so his hand was pinched in the crook of her elbow. Taako ignored her protests and confusion, dragging her over to the little heartbeat thrumming in the hollow under what he thought was probably tree roots.

Once they got close enough, Julia's ranger senses kicked in, and she dropped his hand in a flash to rush over and start digging in...leaves? Most likely? Taako stopped moving once he lost her arm, preferring to close his eyes (dumb, what a stupid habit), and really focus on his field. He felt Julia pushing aside debris, twisting to peer into the roots, heard her small in-drawn gasp and the way her clothes rustled when she reached in. And...that was it. She was cradling something, a living thing that doubtlessly was hers now.

Taako knew there was a small animal in her hands, but he had no way of knowing what kind. Damn. "Is it a squirrel?" he guessed, judging on size. Wait, was it too big for a squirrel? How big were squirrels?

"It's a badger kit," Julia called back, sounding awed. "Poor thing looks half starved. Where is its mother?"

"Dead, probably," Taako said. "I picked up its heartbeat yesterday, and there hasn't been any movement since then."

"Why didn't you tell me yesterday?" Julia demanded, finally getting to her feet.

"Uh, 'cause it might've had a mom yesterday. Today it for sure doesn't, which means you can step into those shoes." He started turning toward the path. "Are we gonna go back and warm it up or what? Probably it needs food, too, if you think we can maybe prioritize that for a bit."

Julia crunched quickly across the leaves to catch his arm. She slid her hand down to his, giving it a squeeze before letting his hand rest at her elbow again. "Thank you," she said softly, brushing a kiss against his cheek. 

He didn't flinch even a little. Progress.

 

The next time Angus visited the little cabin in the woods, Julia had acquired a baby badger she called Pam. Nobody said anything about her as she trundled along after Julia, making furious noises at everyone other than Taako, so Angus thought maybe he'd just ignore it.

He's visited them and found weirder things.

"Hello, sirs!" he called into the general and customary chaos of an early morning. "Hello, ma'am!"

"Hi, Angus!" Julia and Magnus chorused. Merle ducked even further into his garden the way he did when he was pretending Angus didn't exist.

Taako didn't lift his head, but one ear did flick. Altogether a warm welcome!

"I have something to tell you," he said, more to Taako than anyone else.

"Oh?" the elf said with such practiced nonchalance Angus knew he was interested.

"Hey," Magnus chimed, nudging Julia while Pam attacked his boots. "Us too!"

Taako’s shoulders relaxed in the deliberate way that meant he was experiencing some extreme stress. He continued scratching runic marks into one of his magical field anklets, legs crossed under him on the chair. "Hmm."

"We're gonna go into town and get some stuff for Pam," Magnus continued with an enormous smile. "Take her to see an exotic animals vet, y'know? Get her a clean bill of health."

"You can't do that," Merle said from his garden.

Magnus blinked. "Uh. Pretty sure we can."

"You can't," Merle said again, glaring in through the window, "because I've already got a commitment. I'm leaving in a few minutes."

"To what?" Magnus asked incredulously. "Wander the woods?"

"To visit family, you sarcastic little shit."

"Oh! Well. In that case, remind Gundren he owes us, like, a ton of money."

Merle flipped Magnus off and walked away.

"Alright then," Magnus said cheerily. He grinned at Angus while Julia scooped Pam off the floor. "Good timing, Ango! You're okay to stay with Taako?"

"I don't need someone to stay with me," Taako snapped, whole body tense. "I'm fine by myself!"

"I know," Magnus said. "But we need someone to hold onto the cottage's Stone of Farspeech, and you won't do that."

Taako sulked down into his chair. "I could," he muttered.

"Yeah, but you won't." Magnus beamed at Angus while Julia dropped the household's emergency Stone of Farspeech into his hand. 

"Thank you, Angus," Julia said with a grateful pat to his shoulder. "Shouldn't be more than a few days!" She turned away quickly when Pam lunged at him. "Aww, she wants to play with you, what a sweetie."

Within five minutes of arriving, Angus was alone in the cabin with Taako, who was apparently now his responsibility for a while.

"So," Taako said into the awkward silence. "What was it you wanted to tell everybody?"

"Uh," Angus said. He shuffled forward to sit gingerly at the table with Taako and his ever-growing assortment of tools. "Well, sir, it...might not matter now?"

Taako turned a glare in his direction, not quite meeting his eyes but nearly enough to be intimidating. "Are you saying I can't handle it? I can't hear whatever detective thing you came to tell us about? I'm too  _delicate,_  is that it? That's what you're saying?"

Angus deflated. "I...got contacted by a regular client," he admitted slowly.

"Another old lady with a cottage?"

"No, the, um...the city of Rockport?"

Taako finally put his tools down. He extended his leg imperiously toward Angus, chucking the anklet at his head and waiting for him to slide it into place. Then he went over to his Magnus chair, kicked it until it was at perfect lounging recline, and draped himself over it. "Go on," he said, long and curious.

Angus scrambled over to the window seat. "I haven't stopped investigating your case," he swore right off the bat.

"Eh." Taako waved a hand through the air. "I knew Sazed. He'll be tough to find. What's this about Rockport?"

Angus laid out the case: a serial killer called the Rockport Slayer, who targeted wealthy individuals and murdered them for their riches. He left no trace and had been operating in the city for a few months. The Rockport City Council had hired Angus to track the killer down, which he'd been doing in his spare time, but now he had a strong lead that the Slayer would be on the Rockport Limited train tomorrow in pursuit of a powerful magical item.

"This is the best time to catch him," Angus said. "In a confined space, my suspects will be limited. If I don't find him now, it might mean months more work ahead, and a lot more killings."

"So why not just go?" Taako asked, chin cradled in his hand, elbow propped on the armrest, eyes turned in Angus's direction. "I don't get why a big shot detective like you needs to swing by our ramshackle cabin to say  _hi_ before solving a bunch of murders. Do the thing, Agnes."

"Oh, I–" Angus twisted his hands in his lap, gaze darting anywhere that wasn't Taako. Which was ridiculous, Taako couldn't tell where he was looking, but the urge to duck out from under those wide golden eyes was weirdly intense. "Well, sir, it's just... I don't want you to think I stopped working on your case. That I ever stop working on it."

"It's not going anywhere," Taako sighed, collapsing back against his Magnus chair. "Look, kid, you don't need to ask permission. I'm a practical elf. You need to prioritize paying gigs  _some_ times."

"And also," Angus blurted, "I wanted– Uh." He squirmed again when Taako's blank gaze swung over to him. "It's just– A small boy traveling alone draws a lot more attention than a small boy traveling with an adult. Usually I don't have a choice about that so I make up a story about a relative, but this time I thought–"

"What you're really here for is Magnus or Merle or Julia." Taako chuckled. "That figures."

"I am not," Angus protested immediately. "Any of you would have been–!"

Too late, Angus realized he'd fallen directly into Taako's trap. A wicked smirk curled the corners of the elf's mouth. " _Any_ of us, huh?" He clapped his hands once, sharply, as he sat up. "Well! I guess there's nothing for it, then. Gather my things, Ango, we got a murderer to catch."

There was no graceful way to back out of taking Taako along. Even if there had been one, Taako would never have let him actually get away with it.

"You might get recognized," Angus tried, a weak defense even as he hustled around adding a bunch of potions and strange items and a particularly ominous scarf to a bag as Taako pointed and demanded them. 

Taako ran a hand down his long, straight hair. As he did, Disguise Self washed over it, changing the color to a raven black and the texture to something a lot curlier. The bouncing ringlets fell across his face, obscuring most of his features. He put on a pair of enormous black sunglasses, reaching out to snag the cane Magnus made him that he hated. "I'm ready when you are, bubelah."

"But," Angus tried for the last time. 

"Hey, listen, nobody's gonna look at you twice if you're playing Seeing Eye Boy for a gorgeous blind elf. I'm a fantastic conversation starter. Plus I'm coming with you to test a bunch of stuff I've been fiddling with."

Angus sucked in a sharp breath. "Not the bomb."

Taako scoffed at him. "And waste it? No. I'm saving that for a  _real_ special occasion. Not just  _any_  murderous asshole gets to be blown up by Taako's First Bomb."

Oh. Well. That...kind of figured, actually. "Magnus and Julia and Merle would be real disappointed in me if I brought you into danger," Angus sighed, handing Taako his bag.

"Luckily, they're not the boss of you," Taako said, snatching the bag away to loop it over his head and across his chest. " _I am."_ He held out his free hand expectantly.

Angus took it, tucking the long fingers under his upper arm. "Okay, sir, you win. But we're undercover! Nobody can know we're trying to solve the case."

"No problem," Taako said, his cane in hand as he let Angus lead him from the cottage. "I'm actually  _not_ that interested in solving it. I just want to try out my shit and nobody ever lets me go anywhere."

A list of reasons flashed through Angus's mind. Wisely, he elected not to share them. "We can catch a coach in town," Angus said, "and be in Rockport by morning. That gives us plenty of time to get settled on the train before it pulls out of the station. I can do some preliminary investigation before we even leave the city. Oh wait!" He froze without warning, leaving Taako to bump into him with an annoyed sound. "Sorry, sir, I just– I forgot! I need something valuable to store on the train. At some point, I'll probably need to check out the safe, and that's the easiest way to gain access."

Taako frowned down at him. His enormous sunglasses slid slowly down his nose. "You don't have a plan already? Not a very prepared fantasy Boy Scout, are you?" 

Angus flushed, twisting his hands together. "Well, I–I inherited a set of silverware when my grandpa died, I was planning to use that, but..."

"Wait here," Taako said, marching back into the cabin. Angus trailed behind him, curious, refusing to wait even when Taako complained about little boys who couldn't follow directions. The elf snagged a basket from the floor that made a tinkling sound when he shoved it out toward Angus. "Pick the one that looks the most like an heirloom."

The basket was full of glass. Shards, chunks, fragments, all kinds, most with rounded edges to prevent accidental cuts but not all. Angus sorted through carefully, finally settling on a fist-sized piece that had the most interesting facets. He placed it in Taako's outstretched hand, then put the basket back where it had been before. "What're you doing?" he asked.

"Duh," Taako said, glass cupped in his hands. "I'm a transmutation wizard." Red dropped through the glass like dye in a cup of water, swirling until the whole thing was a single, shining color, looking just like...

"A ruby," Angus breathed. He took the stone when Taako tossed it to him. "Oh, sir, that's perfect!"

"Natch," Taako said. "It'll hold up under anything except any kind of dispelling magic. Also, while you're adding stuff to your bag, here." He dug out two potions, one a regular red healing potion and the other full of an orange flickering liquid with smoke in all the empty space. "Potion of Healing, Potion of Fire Breath."

Angus stared at the orange smoking potion. "...Fire Breath?"

"Does what it says on the label."

"But there isn't a–"

" _When_  does the coach leave to take us to Rockport? Do we even have time for quibbling? No, I don't think so." Taako held out his hand again. "Chop chop, Angles, we have places to  _be._ "

Angus tucked away the potions, tucked away the ruby, gathered his courage, and took Taako's hand. It was going to be fine. It was all going to be fine. They were going to catch the bad guy, test out the...stuff, and be back in a few days without any permanent harm being done. Angus had the emergency Stone of Farspeech, so the others could contact them if they got back first. Which they wouldn't because this was all going to be  _fine._

What's the worst that could happen?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> GOD FORGIVE MEEEE


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm trying to post this _while_ a small organ cat sits in my lap and paws at my hand so I'll pet her. That's the kind of dedication I have.
> 
> As usual: Hawk is THE BEST beta. THaannkk yoouu Hawk for being amazinggggg

Everyone else had already jumped off the train. It was only Taako and Angus left. The boy clung to him like a lifeline, arms around his waist, face pressed into his stomach, like there was fuckall Taako could do to protect him at this point. Wind whipped around them, tugging Taako's disenchanted hair around them in a tangling cloud. 

The arcane glasses were broken. He'd used his field so much his bones felt shaky with encroaching magical exhaustion. Both potions had been consumed. Jenkins and the monsters were all dead, but the Rockport Limited was racing toward Neverwinter with an unstoppable force. They had Jenkins' port wand and all the items from the safe, which meant bupkis at the moment. There was nothing Taako could do.

Not alone.

_Damn_ it.

Taako crouched slowly, sliding his hands down the sides of Angus's face to his neck to his shoulders, where he held on tight. He hoped they were basically on eye-level. "Angus," he said, serious as he'd ever been.  Serious as a murder train hurtling toward a packed metropolis. "I can cast the spell to turn that arch you described into a portal, but I can't see it. I can't imagine where it's going. You can do that, you saw that asshole's garden, but you can't cast. Do you get where I'm going with this?"

Angus nodded so frantically Taako could feel it through his hold. "Yes, sir! I can tell you when it's cast too, so we can jump off. We can do it!"

That was certainly the fucking  _plan._

Taako turned to crouch behind Angus, facing what he was relatively certain was the front of the train. He slid his hands down Angus's arms to put the port wand in his (small,  _fuck_ , he was just a little–) hold. Angus gripped the wand tight in both hands, and Taako layered his own tight over them. "Okay," he said, channeling all his remaining magic. "Here we go!"

Angus focused, pointing the wand, and Taako pushed his magic through Angus into the wand, casting the spell that would turn that arch into a city's salvation.

"It's done!" Angus cried. "It's open!"

Taako wrapped one arm around Angus's waist, keeping the other channeling through the wand, and kicked off hard. They flew backward off the train, landing hard. At least Angus had a bit of an elf-shaped cushion. Taako had instinctively tried to land on his feet and–

Well, he'd made worse decisions today.

"The train's through!" Angus shouted. Taako immediately stopped casting, dropping his hand to sprawl against the ground. Gods, what a bad day, what an idiot, what a just...unending clusterfuck of– "We did it!" Angus sounded like he popped right up off the dirt to start a victory dance. "Sir, that was amazing! We should–"

And then, because this was a  _terrible_ day, the Stone of Farspeech chimed.

"Oh no," Angus whispered.

"Not it," Taako croaked immediately, trying to ignore the absolutely alarming way his ankle was throbbing. He'd lost his cane too, Magnus was just gonna–he was gonna love that.

"Excuse me," a new voice said, stern and rough. "Thank you for your work today. But you're gonna have to come with us."

"Hello ma'am or sir," Angus said, presumably into the Stone of Farspeech. "We're just outside Neverwinter, and I think we need your help."

"Taako," came the sound of Magnus's disappointment. "What did you do?"

Well, fuck. That was the question, wasn't it?

 

Magnus got Julia and a confused Merle (who had been wondering about Taako's location for, like, twenty-four full hours without doing anything about it) to the fields outside Neverwinter by late afternoon. Taako was spread out on the ground, arms flung out, hair a dirty golden fan, with his weak ankle propped in Angus's lap. Angus was sitting remarkably still on a small pile of bags, having a fierce conversation with a familiar orc woman, a dragonborn, and a dwarf.

"Killian!" Magnus exclaimed in surprise, lifting a hand to wave when she turned to him. "What're you doing here?"

"I should be surprised to see you," Killian said, sounding a combination of frustrated and amused. "Somehow I'm not though. Are you three gonna be around every time something goes on with the  ~~Relics~~?"

"Is it a curse?" Angus guessed with a layer of exasperation Magnus hadn't heard from the young detective before. "If it's a curse you can just tell me. You don't have to be so secretive about it, for  _hours,_ with no reason."

"Sure I do, kid," Killian said without turning around. "It's my job."

"Plus it's fun," the dragonborn added. Killian grinned back at her.

"I'm Julia," Julia said, holding her free hand out to the newcomers with Pam tucked safely in the other arm. "Mind telling me what's going on here? Why is Taako on the ground?" She smiled, not friendly so much as in warning. "Sure hope you didn't have anything to do with that, Killian."

"They were like this when we got here," the dragonborn said, taking Julia's hand for a shake. "I'm Carey, by the way, and that's Boyland."

Magnus barked a laugh, then immediately tried to pretend it was a cough. Merle laughed and committed to it even as he walked over to poke Taako in the ankle. Taako's whole leg tensed but he didn't pull away, just turned his head to one side and scrunched his face up in pain. He blew out a long, slow breath.

"Man," Merle said, "you must be  _real_ embarrassed about how this happened if you won't even talk shit about it."

Taako remained stubbornly silent.

"We jumped off the back of a runaway train," Angus chirped, "after we used a serial killer's wand to make a portal to send it through, so no one would die. There were other survivors, but they've already gone home. These three came to get an object that was on the train, but Taako said they couldn't have it."

"Finders keepers," Taako agreed, one arm folded across his face while Merle muttered prayers over his ankle. 

Killian rubbed her forehead with a weary sigh. "Why won't you just give it to us?"

"Why won't you tell us why you want it without all that bullshit gargling?"

"I think it's a curse," Angus said again.

"Well, you finally did it," Merle said, hands on his hips. "You finally broke it all to hell. I told you this would happen, but would you wear a brace? No. You're too  _cool_ for–"

"Could you not?" Taako hissed.

"I think we should maybe back up a bit," Julia said, "to the part about jumping off trains? And serial killers? I have some questions."

"We really need that item," Carey said with an apologetic smile. 

"Killian wouldn't take the last one," Magnus pointed out. "We had to toss it in a big glass ball after she ran away. Is this the same kind of thing?"

Taako started to struggle up off the ground. "Listen, you homies knock yourselves out, but Taako's going home. This has been a shit day and I'm ready for a strong glass of wine and a long bath. Fuck this, I'm done."

"You'll break yourself even  _worse,_ you idiot," Merle snapped, pushing Taako back down. "Stop moving!"

When it didn't look like Taako was going to be reasonable, Julia walked over to set Pam on his stomach. "Guard," she ordered. Pam plopped her rump down and started to make a low, unceasing, terrifying sound. Taako patted her head with an annoyed expression.

"You could solve all these problems by just accepting the job offer," Killian said.

"We've gotta really good benefits package," Carey added in a wheedling tone.

"Could our other friends join too?" Magnus asked, indicating Taako and Angus. "We can't leave them behind, they're family."

"You three got the first  ~~Relic~~ , and they got this one." Carey looked up at Killian. They both shrugged. "I'm sure the Director wants as many Reclaimers as she can get. Seeing as currently she has none."

Magnus and Julia shared a look very similar to Carey and Killian's. "It'd be safer in a secret society," Magnus said with a thoughtful scratch of his beard.

"They probably have more resources too," Julia agreed.

"Can we negotiate our contracts?" Angus asked. "I have some stipulations."

Killian, Carey, and the taciturn Boyland all blinked at him.

"Can't hurt to ask," Merle said. "I'd need a few promises too."

"So I think this is a yes," Magnus said with a big grin. "Conditionally."

"Does anybody care what I think?" Taako spat, one hand on Pam's back. "I absolutely–" Pam's low-key angry noises pitched up, straight through furious and into worried. On the heels of that deeply concerning change, Taako sucked in a sharp breath, eyes wide, back bowing slightly off the ground. "N-Never mind," he stammered, pulling Pam tight against his belly as he sat up. "I, uh. Actually I'm for it. Let's go. Like. Now."

Julia knelt by Taako to touch his shoulder, face creased in worry. "Taako?" she called softy, trying to draw his attention. His ears flatted and he ducked closer to her body. Julia's eyes widened in shock even as she wound a comforting arm around his shoulder. "Sweetheart, what's wrong?"

"My... The spell network. At the cabin. It's been–triggered. Broken. It's  _gone."_

Angus reached up as high as he could–still being careful not to move–to touch Taako's knee. "Sir, what does that mean? Is there someone in the cabin?"

Taako shuddered. "Enough people that the network shut down. It– That would take." He pressed his lips together, then his forehead into the meat of Julia's shoulder. "We can't go back. There aren't a lot of people who'd sack the cabin. We can't."

Julia scooped Taako, still holding onto Pam, into her arms and stood. Taako bit back first a bark of pain, then a string of complaints, and settled sulkily into her hold. "Let's go," Julia said to Magnus, to Merle and Angus, to the team taking them to the moon.

Angus gathered all their bags and scrambled after her.

"Hey!" Magnus said, looking around. "Where's Taako's cane?"

"Sorry can't hear you," Taako called back. "Pam's being too loud."

Pam, who had fallen silent once Julia picked Taako up, licked her own nose.

"I'll just keep making them," Magnus threatened. "I'll make them and make them until you  _have_ to like one. That's  _math."_

"How is that math?" Angus asked.

"You're gonna fit in just fine," Carey laughed, leading them to an enormous glass sphere hidden a bit away. "Are you ready?" she asked them, popping a door open. 

"For what?" Merle asked, climbing in before anyone could answer.

"For the rest of your lives," Boyland said.

"Oh my god," Taako groaned. "Is this what we have to deal with now?"

"You'll learn to love it," Killian said, helping Magnus give Julia a hand into the sphere so she didn't have to put Taako down. "Okay," she continued once everyone was settled. "Everyone set?"

"No," Taako muttered.

She ignored him, pressing on her bracer. "Here we go!"

"Hey question," Taako said as the sphere was lifting off the ground. "I wasn't paying attention earlier. Where're we going, exactly?"

"To the moon!" basically everyone else in the sphere chorused.

"Aw, fuck."

 

All things considered, Lup actually lucked out as far as the moon base went. Lucretia (who was going to have some explaining to do later, how had she aged so quickly?) had a pretty sweet setup going. Competent employees, state-of-the-art facilities, a secret and trap-protected office. Very nice.

Not nice enough, of course. Her lich protections were kind of a weak point. Oh, she'd for sure increase them after this, which was why Lup's timing was so perfect. She knew Lucy pretty well after a hundred years. Her traps and puzzles might have tripped up a less prepared lich (sorry Bar), but not Lup. She was in and out with a flask of goop from both Fisher and the secret second voidfish (the  _baby voidfish,_ which needed to be back with its  _parent,_  Mags was gonna  _flip)_ within a day.

Her luck was related to a crop of newcomers to the organization that had drawn Lucy's attention away from her work. She'd actually left in something of a hurry, which was...curious. Curious enough that even though she should have left with her prize immediately, Lup drifted around for a bit, trying to figure out what the hullabaloo was all about.

And, oh, Magnus and Merle were here. They were settling into a pair of dorms that shared a common wall, and Magnus had a woman with him–Julia, his wife!, carrying some kind of small, furious animal–and they all  _knew_ each other, they'd found each other! Lup's heart swelled with joy and relief and she wished she could cry just to have some way of expressing all the tangled, soaring emotions–

"Should you even be here?" Magnus asked Merle with a friendly nudge to his shoulder that almost sent the dwarf sprawling. "I thought Taako was still your patient. Shouldn't you be with him in the infirmary?"

"I'm savin' him the bottom bunk," Merle snapped back waspishly. "I think that's more than enough generosity for an elf who would fling himself off a moving–"

Lup was already gone. She raced back through the dorm, incorporeal body thrumming. Taako was here. Taako was hurt but he was  _here,_ she could see Taako, see her heart, make fun of him for whatever he'd done to land himself in medical so soon after joining up with Lucretia. He wouldn't be able to hear her but she could  _see him._  Where was– Where was the infirmary, where was  _Taako,_  where was he–

She heard him first, heard his complaining, and he couldn't be hurt too bad if he was whining about it, if it was bad he'd be trying to hide and refusing to talk at all. But his voice rang down the hallway, annoyed and pissy, in the middle of an argument with someone. "You're gonna have to re-erase my memories and kick me off this moon base, then, because I'm not putting that thing on. How many times do I have to explain that having a job isn't worth messing up my field?"

"You won't even tell me what this field  _is,_ Taako. It is a requirement for all members of the Bureau to wear the bracers," came Lucretia's calm response, underscored with exasperation. "As much as I need your help, as the world needs it, I cannot make an exception for you."

"Then  _chuck me._ Off the  _moon."_

"Ma'am," said a fancy little boy, "I don't think you understand. Taako needs it." Lup zoomed around the corner, into the room, just in time for the boy to say, "He's blind."

Everything ground to a halt. Lucretia drew in a sharp, short breath. She stood just inside the room in a flowing gown that gave a queenly air to her usual gravitas. Davenport was at her side in a little, like, a butler outfit? What the fuck?

"He made it to help him see," the boy continued, standing next to one of the beds and apparently oblivious to the bombshell he'd just dropped.

"Way to give up all my secrets, Angus," Taako muttered, sitting on that bed with arms crossed, face turned away. Lup felt like she was seeing him through a great distance. His hair was long, longer than she'd seen since they were first out on the road and he got a lesson on what made long hair dangerous, loose around his shoulders in a way that didn't seem like him at all. Taako was usually all about complicated twists and braids and up-dos, he almost never let people catch him with it down. Why would–

His left foot and ankle were all wrapped up tight, too. What kind of bullshit had he been putting himself through that his  _foot and/or ankle were hurt._ Why hadn't someone stopped him from–!

He had scars. Faint. But Lup could still see them. Thick around each wrist, mottled up both arms.

Scaring across his eyes nearly all the way from one temple to the other. Like someone had. Splashed. Something  _caustic._ And his eyes were open wide but he wasn't looking at anyone he wasn't  _looking_ he was– While she was gone and he was supposed to be safe on the Starblaster or at least in the protection of their friends their  _family, someone had hurt him and **Lup hadn't been there**_

Lup slammed into view without a thought. Everyone in the room jumped–except Taako. " ** _What happened,_** " Lup demanded in a voice even she hardly recognized. And now, at last, Taako jumped too, unseeing eyes widening further in shock as he–flinched back. Scrambled away. Tried to  _escape_ from her.

In the back of her mind, she knew what was happening, knew how a big a role Taako played in her ability to resist falling into her lich powers. Fire raced across her body anyway, fueled by her rage and helplessness. " **Who!** " she screamed, not just fire but her entire form exploding in waves of malice and intent across the room. 

"Lup!" Lucretia cried, trying to step through her miasma, get close enough to reach her in some way. "Lup, you have to stop, you'll lose yourself!"

Who fucking  _cared?_ Lup would find the one responsible for this, and she would kill them. She would drink their agony like a fine wine, consume all that was good and light in them in the heat of her wrath. No one would  _touch_ her brother and–

On the bed, Taako's breathing had pitched toward panic. He was crushed against the wall looking like he would burrow through if he had the power. He should have had the  _power,_ if he'd been able to Blink nobody could have hurt him. If he'd had his magic none of this would have happened!

The boy touched Taako's arm, trying to steady him, and Taako screamed.

Her brother  _screamed,_ pulling away so hard that he fell off the bed, crying out again when his foot hit the ground. The boy pulled away, but Davenport, her captain, leapt into action. He got between Lup and Taako with his fists raised, stance squared up for a fight, from doll to boxer in the space of a breath. "Davenport," he said, as much a challenge for her to try her luck with him as anything she'd ever heard.

"It's him," Taako gasped to the boy, who'd finally managed to get an arm around his shoulders. "It's him it's  _him,_ Angus, he's here he found us, Angus it's  _Kalen–"_

"No," the boy said, terrified and defiant. "You're still safe from him, sir. He can't find us on the moon. This is something else. But don't worry, sir, we'll protect you!"

This?  _Protect?_  Nobody needed to protect Taako from Lup, she was–

All at once, Lup came back to herself. She could see the way her loss of control had damaged the room, torn it apart, saw how Taako shook in her shadow. She reached for him, brokenhearted. Her power brushed his shoulder and he screamed again.

Screamed at her touch.

Lup wailed, spectral hands pushing deep into her hair. Her form curved in on itself, a ball of misery around the flask that had been her only mission. There was nothing she could do for Taako, not like this. She needed her body.

She needed her Barry.

"Lup," Lucretia begged. "Please, I can–"

Lup fled. Out of the infirmary, off the moon, through the sky and across Faerun. To the cave where Barry was checking on her growing body with the meticulous care he reserved pretty much only for her. Now. These days. In this...terrible place where he had no family but her.

Barry turned with a wide smile when she blew into the cave. "Lup!" he said, voice warm and familiar and he still didn't know her but she loved him  _so much._ She dropped the flask into his hands and curled around him, desperate for comfort, to stay herself, to cry and be held. Barry's whole body tensed. "Lup? Are you alright? I mean, you're not alright, you're– Lup, please, can you tell me what's wrong? You look like you're coming apart!"

"Taako didn't know me," she said, and it wasn't what she meant. She knew he'd forgotten her, they'd all been made to forget each other, she'd been ready for it. But she'd also thought he'd be otherwise okay. That he'd be whole. She'd imagined him in a kind of stasis, physically, that he'd have new memories and experiences but he'd be basically  _okay._  And he wasn't.

He wasn't.

She had no way of explaining all that while Barry was still locked in the same memory wipe, so what came out was, "Taako didn't  _know_  me."

Barry's concern morphed into determination. He yanked the lid off her flask and knocked back a mouthful of goop like it was a particularly awful shot. "I can help you," he said, already collapsing to his knees. "Just...just gimme a sec."

It took longer than that for the hundred years to break free of the voidfish. Barry shook and gasped, tears dripping down his face. Lup hovered over him like a protective haze, giving him as much comfort as an incorporeal lich could. His suffering gave Lup something to focus on, something other than the fate of her brother, let her pull the fragmented bits of herself back together.

"If I didn't know we were under kind of a time crunch," Barry coughed when he finally came back to himself, "I would kill myself just so I could hug you. Gods, Lup–" He smiled up at her like the sun rising after a winter storm, bright and fragile and quiet with hope. "It's good to have you back."

Lup curled around him. "Taako didn't know me," she whispered.

Barry coughed again, shaking his head even as he wrapped a careful arm around the air she inhabited. "Well, we know why now, at least. And your body's almost done. We can work on the rest later."

"He's blind," Lup said, hearing the helpless pain in her voice. "It looks deliberate. He was all alone, and somebody  _blinded_ him, and I wasn't there! And I wanted to help but he doesn't  _know_ me and I scared him, I– He was terrified of me, Barry, I've never seen him so–"

"Keep it together," Barry said, kind and firm. "You have to stay with me, Lup, at least until you get back in your body. He's alive, right? He's safe, for now."

"I thought he was safe  _before!"_

Barry shook his head again, finally climbing to his feet. "We have to do what we can now, babe, and work on the rest later. You want to help Taako? Taako's with Lucretia, and Lucretia's hunting the Relics. She's gonna try her plan, and we can't let that happen. So it's all tied in together. Once you have a body, we can confront them. For now, though, the best we can do is plan." He reached out to touch her form, gently brushing his fingers through the red of her cloak. "Okay, sweetheart? Body and then all the rest. It'll go quick once you're corporeal again. This is the only time for planning we'll have. Are you with me?"

Lup looked at Barry, then over to her body in that weird tube, nearly but not quite ready. She drew a deep, useless breath and nodded. "Okay," she said. "Okay. One step at a time, right? Taako's safe, he's going to be okay." She nodded, will and determination pulling her form back together. "I'm with you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *shoulder shimmy*


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I BACK

The Seekers found another Relic. Angus worried, at first, that Taako would want to go along but...

As soon as it was over, Taako refused to talk about what happened in the infirmary with anyone. He let them fix him up with a cast, reiterated to the Director that she could leave him alone or throw him off the moon but he wasn't wearing a bracer, and followed Angus to the dorms. The other three knew something had happened, but Taako crawled into his bunk and turned his back to them and went to sleep. Julia put Pam in the bed with him and they all snuck away for lunch. Angus filled them in as best he could, considering he  _also_ didn't really know what had happened.

Some...wraith or something had attacked the infirmary, demanding to know what happened, lost control of itself, scared Taako half to death, and vanished. 

"On a, um, positive note," Angus concluded, picking at what remained of his sandwich. "I don't think the Director is going to force Taako to wear a bracer? She seemed a little shaken after everything. And she didn't realize Taako's blind, or that his field helps him navigate the world."

"That's a good reason to stress," Magnus said, rubbing his forehead. "I think Taako'd be pissed if we just said, like, he doesn't want to wear it because it reminds him of that one time he had  _shackles."_

Julia kicked him under the table. "Definitely a thing we don't want to talk about," she said with a meaningful look around. No one was directly next to them, but discretion was still the better call.

Magnus ducked down a little in his seat. "Right," he said, eyes darting around suspiciously.

"I bet he hurt his ankle worse, didn't he?" Merle said before taking a long swig of his drink, leaving a milk mustache soaked into his actual mustache. "Boy's got a gift for that."

"I'm gonna make him another cane," Magnus decided and got up immediately.

"Taako hates canes," Julia called after him.

"I'll make a cane so great even  _he_ can't hate it!"

It took Magnus a few days to carve a replacement, which he presented to Taako with a flourish. Taako walked it across the moon base for the express purpose of tossing it off the side.

"That might hit someone!" Magnus cried.

"Should've thought about that earlier, thug," Taako said, walking back toward the warehouse he was slowly turning into a new artificing workshop. Angus trotted after him, struggling not to giggle at the expression on Magnus's face. 

By the time the other Seekers had a firm lead on the next Relic, Taako seemed to have bounced back so completely from his ordeal that Angus was  _sure_ he'd ask to go along. Instead, he froze at his busiest work table, ears going flat. He nodded firmly so the remade arcane glasses would slide from the top of his head down over his eyes. 

"Uh, kinda busy here," he said, focusing too intently on the assortment of metal shavings in front of him. He carefully picked one up with a set of tweezers and dropped it in a beaker of...something. A liquid that fizzled and rumbled ominously then let off a tiny mushroom cloud of aggressively purple light before returning to (what looked like) its inert form. Angus could have written it off as Taako just being okay with staying in his workshop, but...

His hands were shaking.

"It's probably for the best," Magnus said, heading toward the hanger with a length of wood tucked under his arm and a carving knife in hand. "His magic field isn't really ready for another test run, I think. Plus!" He brandished the stick. "I haven't made him a really great cane yet. He'll want that before he comes back down with us."

"He's probably still feeling shaky about Kalen," Julia said in a low, private tone, Pam cradled to her chest gnawing on...something. "Losing the cottage and getting attacked in the infirmary so close together must have been a real blow. His confidence will bounce back. We'll just give him some time." She chuckled and gave his shoulder a pat. "I'm sure destroying a few more of Magnus's canes will help him feel better."

"Maybe Magnus could try a staff instead," Angus suggested. "Or almost anything that isn't just a walking stick. Ma'am, respectfully, Taako is  _never_  going to use a plain walking stick."

Julia actually laughed. "I know!"

Well. Okay.

The Reclaimers were gone for two days. During that time, Angus kept himself busy working on plans for the next time he went down to the surface. He had leads to follow up on and people to interview and while he'd submitted a formal report to the Rockport City Council, they had some questions. Angus caught up on his favorite fantasy forensics journals and began some research on behalf of the Director. 

And if he happened to do all these things while sitting in Taako's workshop, at least everybody knew where to find him and he knew Taako wasn't alone. 

At first, Taako ignored him, strapping on a brand new pair of arcane goggles and focusing on...more metal? He had different kinds around him still, larger pieces, and seemed to be starting on some delicate work. Taako took notes on a large piece of paper with a quill and arcane-infused ink that was invisible to anyone not specifically looking for its magical properties. Mostly he was stubbornly silent, but he'd gotten used to talking to himself about his projects at the cottage, so it didn't take him long to be muttering under his breath. It wasn't that he forgot Angus was there–Angus made a lot of noise to ensure Taako couldn't forget–so he was just going to take it as a sign that Taako was getting over what happened.

By the time the others got back, Taako seemed nearly back to normal. He'd been totally consumed by his latest project, whatever it was, either actively metalworking or researching in the new library he was creating by slowly migrating the entire artificing and arcane collections in the moon's library to his workshop. Angus had watched several people search for the books and said nothing. It wasn't his fault none of them thought to check with Taako. It wasn't like the elf was being subtle.

When Julia and Magnus and Merle came to check on them after delivering their Relic to its final destruction, they looked like they were in much worse shape than Taako.

"What happened?" Angus asked, sliding off his stool at Taako's work table with concern.

Julia's bottom lip quivered. "We lost two people," she said in a soft voice. Merle and Magnus both looked away. 

Then Magnus cleared his throat, scrubbing a hand over his eyes. "Anyway," he said, "we got a real nice bag of gold for our trip. Either of you want to come with to the Fantasy Costco?"

Taako's ears perked up. He straightened, turning toward them while pulling his arcane goggles off. "Fantasy Costco, you say? Give me a second." He rummaged around his workstation, packing a bunch of what looked like spare parts and junk. "Let's go!"

The resulting haggle between Taako and the Deals Warlock not only got him semi-permanently banned from the establishment (but with a bag full of everything he'd gone in there to get), it lifted the flagging spirits of the other members of their rag-tag family. Not the goal, probably, but...

It was nice, all the same.

"When the next Relic turns up," Taako said, dumping his haul out across his work table, "Taako's gonna be ready as  _fuck."_

Oh. Well.

That was a little less nice.

"Perfect," Magnus said, holding out a beautifully carved stick. "Then you'll need this!"

Taako took the cane from him and hurled it like a javelin directly out the nearest window. "Anyway now I have to get back to work, shoo. Not you, Angles!" he snapped when Angus got ready to leave with the others. "I haven't fired you yet so you're still my assistant. Pam can stay too." The badger was asleep under his stool anyway. Julia giggled and waved and left with the other two, presumably to find food. "You're gonna love this," Taako said, bent back over his secret project.

Angus opened his mouth to ask, looked around the room for just a second as though he could figure it out on his own, then let the mystery go.

Sometimes it was more fun to be surprised.

Taako was late for the Candlenights party. He both knew that and also didn't actually care. The excuse he was using to avoid it at the moment was that his gifts weren't quite ready. A lie: They'd been ready for nearly a week. Still, it kept him out of the new Reclaimer dorm, which was doubtlessly packed with, like. People. All crushed in close. Touching. Loud.

Angus had promised to come get him once most everyone was gone. In the meantime, Taako was chilling in his workshop, goggles in place, playing with some diamond dust.

Wait, no, he was making notes during the whole thing so it wasn't playing, it was an  _experiment._

The door to his workshop slid open.

"Yo, Ango," Taako called without picking up his head. "That was some dull party if it's over already."

Whoever was in the door– _not_ Taako's boy wonder assistant–cleared their throat.

Taako jolted, lifting his head (useless) and pushing his field out at the same time (a better instinct by far). It washed over the intruder, echoing against the outline of a tall woman. More importantly, it lit up her staff like the sun. If Taako had been able to stare into the sun without hurting himself. The sensation of light was intense but not painful.

Weirdly like the Relics, actually. Hmm.

"Madam Director," Taako said, wondering if he had time to hide all the books he'd gathered. "Uh. To what do I owe the– This is so unexpected... Um." He squirmed on his stool. "...Happy Candlenights?"

The Director stepped forward, poise in every motion but radiating a kind of uncertainty that felt a lot like something he'd pick up off Ango. How old was she, anyway? "Happy Candlenights, Taako," she said politely. "I trust you're having a good one?"

Taako spread his arms to indicate the solitude of his workshop. "I'm, uh. Having a one." He let his arms drop and pulled off the arcane goggles to rub at his forehead where an ache was developing. Maintaining the field and arcane sight at the same time was still a work in progress. "I don't figure this is a social call, to be frank."

"It's not," she admitted.

"You found another Relic."

"We did."

The apologetic note in her voice had Taako gripping his pen a little too tight. It'd been hard to make; he didn't want to break it. "I am going to go with them," he said, carefully setting the pen aside. "I can help."

"Normally I'd agree, but this is–"

"I'm not a burden," Taako snapped. "I don't need to be coddled!"

"This isn't coddling," the Director insisted. "The situation is  _complicated_." 

"Uncomplicate it!"

"Taako, you are–!" She took an audibly deep, slow breath. Taako felt a sting of satisfaction: at least he'd thrown her off her perfect game. "It's the Philosopher's Stone," she said in her low, calm way. "Normally, Taako, you'd be the first on my list to go. It's a transmutation artifact, and you–"

"Hey!" Taako leapt out of his seat. "I'm a–"

"I know, Taako! Please, let me explain."

Taako reluctantly sat back down. 

"The Stone was taken by our lead scientist, Lucas Miller." Taako wrinkled his nose. Lucas spent a lot of time picking at Taako's projects, and not in an interesting way. That guy had always been too full of himself. "He's had an accident, and his whole lab was transmuted into pink tourmaline. Normally that wouldn't prevent me from sending you but, Taako, everything the tourmaline touches is crystallized too. We have to send the teams in wearing null suits, which will almost certainly impact your...your field. I can't...I can't risk you, Taako."

"I can update the system," Taako said without any real hope, exhaustion curving his shoulders. Just when he thought he'd figured this whole...blind thing out. There was always  _something._

"There isn't time," the Director said, sounding regretful and firm. "Lucas's lab uses the same technology we do. It flies, Taako, and it's falling. If it touches the sea–"

"The whole world crystallizes and it's end game. Fine. Okay.  _Whatever."_  Taako gathered the five small packages waiting at the edge of his table and stood up. "But I get to give them their Candlenights stuff before they go, and you have to kick all those people out of my dorm."

"Deal," the Director said.

At least she kept her word. As soon as the Director finished her explanation, she hustled most everyone out of the room, leaving Taako with his f– ...people.

"Don't be saps about this," he said firmly, handing out the gifts. "You're all part of my experiment, okay?" He knelt to give out the last gift: a meaty bone with an edible ribbon tied around it. Pam grumbled in pleasure and dragged it over to her little bed by the fantasy fireplace.

"Sure, Taako," Julia said, laughter warm in her voice. "Hey, is that a new hairpin? It's beautiful!"

Taako touched the pin holding a lock of his hair back from his face. If he'd done his work right, it'd look like a pretty enough silver dove. The aesthetics had been the trickiest part, for obvious reasons. The simple bit had been the actual point, which was the emergency charge of Calm Emotions he'd worked into the metal.

"Holy shit," Julia breathed. Taako heard rustling and guessed that Julia had opened her box and was lifting out her own hairpin: a white badger sniffing the ground suspiciously. "I love it! Taako, it's  _gorgeous,_ how did you–?"

"Yeah yeah," Taako interrupted, "but listen: if you touch it, it'll expend a charge and cast Detect Traps. Okay? You only get one a day for now so use it well. With some tweaking I think I can get it up to three but–"

"Are you  _serious?"_  Julia demanded incredulously. "Taako! You made me a  _magical artifact_  for Candlenights?"

Tension coiled in Taako's stomach. "...Yes?"

Julia tackled him.

"Mine's a duck pin!" Magnus cheered. "Aw, I love ducks. And copper! That's a good color for a duck." 

"He's pinning it on his shirt, right in the front," Julia said. She gave Taako a little shake. "What's it do?"

"Charm Person," Taako said. "With advantage."

"Hey," Magnus protested. "I don't need Charm Person, I'm rustically hospitable!"

"That's what gives you the advantage."

"Aww, Taako. Thanks, I love it!"

Angus cuddled in against the side Julia wasn't crushing. "Oh, sir, it's a mongoose! Thank you!"

"What a pretty pendant," Julia cooed. "And a chain too, that's so thoughtful. Here Angus, lean forward, I'll help you with the clasp. ...Taako, is this gold?"

"It'll help you decipher languages," Taako said over Julia's questions. 

"I got a shirt pin too," Merle said. "Iron, I think. And I'm puttin' it on, don't worry. Why an owl?" He chuckled. "'Cause I'm wise?"

Taako laughed for a long time. "No, hahaha, god. Wise,  _shit,_ that's funny. The owl detects lies, so maybe you can stop tossing Zone of Truth around when you don't actually need it. The owl is basically an oval, it was easy to make."

"You little shit," Merle said with warmth in his voice. "Well, you'll have to be satisfied with a hug 'cause I didn't get anybody anything."

"I carved you a duck!"

"I think you chucklefucks have to go to your fancy mission," Taako said, planting his foot on Julia's back to push her firmly away. "I'm going to spend the night taking a bath that uses  _all_  the hot water, then maybe I'll have a lavish dinner, and then a long comfortable sleep." He flicked a salute at the others. "Have fun storming the castle."

He could tell they wanted to talk to him more about how he couldn't come, maybe comfort him or whatever, but fuck that. Things were the way they were and being sad about it wouldn't help. Taako kicked them all out, even Angus, who was needed to monitor their progress. For the first few minutes after they left, Taako actually started to get ready to take a bath.

Fuck that too, though.

Instead, he spent the night tackling a project he'd been putting off too long: setting up a magical field system in the dorm. He had the tools all on-hand, and the lack of other people meant a lack of  _witnesses,_ which meant he could pace off the dimensions of the room without judgement or curiosity or weird looks. Other than Pam, of course, who wouldn't fit in a null suit, and was instead spending the night keeping an eye on Taako and chewing on her Candlenights bone.

To be spiteful, he invaded the other two bedrooms, too, putting anchors for the network throughout literally the whole dorm. Even the bathrooms.  _All of it._  He added more anchors in his personal rooms and the kitchen than anywhere else, although the main sitting area got a lot too. It was going to be better than the cabin, more sophisticated, taught to track not just movement but like.  _Emotional states._ He could do it; emotions were tied to a ton of physiological systems, surely he could use arcane energies to track, like. When someone’s heart was doing weird things, or their sweat glands. When breathing patterns changed. That sort of thing.

Maybe it’d take a lot of work but most really worthwhile things  _did_. You couldn’t just wish a cheesecake into existence. Same thing with an experimental arcane field network. Not that he was ever going to  _admit_ how much work it took; the mystery was a huge part of the whole project. Keep ‘em guessing. Like  _hell_ Taako was going to be the only person in the dorm just slightly on his toes all the time.

While he was shuffling around on the floor drawing sigils with his arcane ink, Pam trundling along behind him, he ran into something unexpected. Someone, at some point, had thrown a plush carpet over the middle of the living room floor. Not anywhere else in the whole dorm; just here. He wiggled his fingers under it curiously, testing the floor for, like, trap doors or something. What it felt like was glass. He frowned, confused. Why would there be glass…?

A window. It had to be a window. The others had said this dorm was at the very bottom of the moon base, right? They had a window to look down on all of Faerun as it passed by and they. Covered it. They could see it and they didn’t want to.

Taako tore the carpet away with both hands, flinging it across the room. He pressed his palms onto the glass, cold with the altitude, or the weather, or both. The window wasn’t huge, but it must have been a beautiful— The view had to be—

Water dripped down onto the glass, surprising Taako. He sat back, bringing a hand up to touch his cheeks. Also wet. Damn.

Something must have sprung a leak.

He leaned forward until his forehead touched the glass. The cold felt nice against his flushed skin, so he shifted around until he was curled up on the glass—the window—eyes shut, arms wrapped tight around his body. Pam made a worried noise and snuffled over to him, curling up against his back.

They might have laid there for hours. Taako lost all sense of time, sucked down into a darkness more profound than a mere lack of sight. Faerun passed by beneath him, and he’d never see it. The mountains, trees, oceans, rivers…it might as well not exist for him. If the others failed their mission and the world turned to pink crystal, he wouldn’t know, even lying on this window, unless someone thought to come down and tell him.

Eventually, Pam bit him.

Taako sat up with a hiss, batting at her where she had her little teeth chomped firmly into his calf. “Alright,” he grumbled, getting an arm around her tummy while he wiped at his face with the other. “Al _right,_ okay, I get it! I’ll stop moping, jeez, ow.” He rubbed at his unbroken but probably bruised skin, frowning down at Pam where she was making happy noises in his arms. “You could have just said  _please.”_

She wasn’t wrong, though. It didn’t help to think about the window, or what he couldn’t do. He’d lost enough time to being weak.

Time to get to work.

It didn’t take long to finish the basic anchors. He’d been mostly done when he got, uh. Distracted. After cleaning up all of the propriety pieces of his setup and none of the regular garbage, he tossed the carpet back over the window, picked Pam up, and went to bed. Initially he’d planned on having a good soak, a fancy meal, but—

Whatever.

He went to bed, Pam curled warm with him under the blanket. The others would be back soon enough with a full report. All Taako wanted to do was sleep.

So he did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *shoulder shimmy*


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'M LATE AGAIN. Soorrryyy! I forgot what day it was D:
> 
> Here you go!

When Julia and the boys got back from the Miller lab, she tried to keep them quiet. Taako seemed to be asleep and he didn't really need to be woken up for a late-night celebration. Merle was still pretty annoyed about his arm, though, and was vocal about how much he was never going to forgive Magnus. Which of course meant Magnus had to defend his own honor by reminding him that Merle would be  _crystal_ if it weren't for his quick chopping action. Which looped right back to Merle being loud about losing his arm.

Personally Julia thought the soulwood arm was cooler anyway, but she supposed Merle could be mad about it if he really wanted.

Not even a late dinner (early breakfast?) could shut them up, so, inevitably, Taako wandered out, hair disheveled with a grumpy scowl. Pam was still asleep, curled up is his arms. Julia felt a warm swell of affection for them but didn't actually say  _aw_ out loud because Taako was kind of touchy about how adorable he accidentally was.

"Sorry," Julia said from where she was flipping another pancake just the way Taako had once taught her (and hasn't that been an interesting experience). "I told them to keep it down."

"I'm not surprised they couldn't," Taako grumbled. He shuffled over to the table, taking a seat. Once he set Pam down, he buried his face in her warm little body like she was a pillow. "The fuck happened to your arm?" he said into the badger fur.

Merle jerked his soulwood thumb at Magnus. "This asshole chopped it off."

Magnus threw his hands in the air. "To  _save_ your  _life,_ you ungrateful dick!" he yelled back, cheeks full of pancake.

"How could you tell?" Julia asked, sliding a place of bacon in front of Taako. Pam shifted around so she could nibble at a piece without dislodging the dozing elf.

"Got the field network up and going," he grunted, reaching around Pam for some bacon.

"Taako, you're never going to believe who we met," Magnus said before jamming more pancake in his mouth.

"You're probably right, so let's just skip it."

"The Grim Reaper!"

Taako finally picked his head up. His face was a vision of skepticism. "Horseshit."

"We really did," Julia promised, adding her latest batch of pancakes to Taako's plate. She moved it just out of Pam's reach, ignoring the resulting grumbles. "He was trying to kill us, at first. He said Merle and Magnus have a  _bunch_ of deaths in his, I guess, accounting book? And he wanted to take them to the Eternal Stockade, which is prison in the Astral Plane."

"Sounds like a jerk," Taako yawned, tearing apart a pancake without actually eating it.

"More like a dork," Magnus said. "He was cute, though, right, Julia?"

"Once he stopped being a crystal golem he was super cute," Julia agreed.

Taako's ears pricked up in interest. "Oh?" he said, cradling his chin in his hand. "Do tell."

Julia described him to the best of her ability: the broad shoulders, the long black locs, the red eyes, the adorably terrible accent. "I think it's fake," she added with a giggle. "Although I don't know why he'd do that! It's a shame we'll probably never see him again."

"A real shame," Taako agreed, finally popping a shred of pancake into his mouth.

Success.

Julia's Stone of Farspeech chimed with Angus's frequency. "Well that's odd," Julia mused, digging for it in her pockets. "I thought he was here!"

Taako sat up sharply. "He told me he was going with the Director to help advise you guys on the lab's traps."

"Hello ma'am," came Angus's voice, small and serious. "Hello, sirs."

"Hi, Angus," Julia said, glancing around at the others. Even Pam had picked up her head. "Where are you? We didn't even realize you were gone!"

"I had a lead I had to follow. I didn't know if it would work out, so I didn't want to get anyone's hopes up. But it did work out. If you're feeling up to it, I need your help."

"Sure, Ango," Magnus said. "With what?"

"Please go to the hanger and speak with Avi. I've already sent him coordinates as well as cleared your travel with the Director."

"Angus," Merle said, rising slowly from his seat. "Where are you?"

"On the surface, sir. At a tavern." They heard him draw a deep, steadying breath. "I found Sazed."

Taako didn't come with them to the surface. Someday soon Pam would be real useful in a fight, but for now she was too little, and had to stay back. So Taako volunteered to stay with her, to make sure she was okay.

While he said it, he had a firm hold on his new hairpin, the dove that cast Calm Emotions. Nobody called him on the weak excuse. Honestly, they all felt better knowing he was safe on the moon.

Magnus called the Director on their way to the hanger, just to double check that they weren't about to run into any resistance when they got to the hanger. He didn't have to bother: She was there herself when they arrived.

"Part of Angus's employment contract involved stipulations about this situation," she admitted when they asked if it was okay for them to go down. "He needed the freedom to continue this investigation, and guaranteed access to our brig. He wouldn't disclose to me the reasons he needed those things. I believe now might be a good time to tell me what, exactly, is going on."

"Actually, ma'am," Magnus said, face set on hard lines, "what now is the time for is ass kicking. This isn't our story to tell, it's Taako's. If you want to know about it, you'll have to ask him."

"Not now though," Merle added, slipping around the Director to climb into one of the glass spheres.

"I don't think Pam'd let you near him when he's in such an emotional state anyway," Julia admitted. "Maybe Angus can tell you more later, but right now the boys're right. We have to go. And we appreciate your understanding in all this, ma'am. I'm sure you'll hear the whole story, once Taako feels more comfortable with you."

A strange, wounded expression moved through the Director's eyes. Then she stepped back. "Of course," she said. "I won't keep you. And if whoever you're going down there to get has anything to do with how much suffering Taako's apparently been through... Well. Kick his fucking ass, will you? On behalf of all of us."

Magnus shot her a vicious grin. "Count on it, ma'am."

Angus was in a dark corner table in a rundown tavern in a no-name village smack dab in the middle of nowhere. Even so late at night or early in the morning or whatever it was, there were rough beings at most of the tables. It wasn't loud, but there was enough noise to cover their conversation when they sat down at the table with Angus.

"Who?" Magnus demanded immediately, voice dark as it only ever was when he was talking about the people who'd hurt Taako.

Angus's mouth pressed into a thin line. "Taako gave me an enchantment to put on this cloak that would make people who look at me see an older halfling man," he said, barely moving his lips as he spoke. "Nobody's paying much attention to me, so I haven't caused a fuss. I think that's the only reason Sazed hasn't run. He seems...jumpy."

"Well he killed forty people in a botched murder attempt," Julia said. "I'd be jumpy too." 

"I'll tell you where Sazed is if you promised not to charge in," Angus continued, speaking specifically to Magnus. "I've got a stone that will capture what he says, and I'd like to try and get a confession out of him now rather than back up on the base." 

"I promise," Magnus said solemnly. Merle nodded, so Julia did too. Angus quietly indicated a table in the corner where a handsome man sad with his back to the wall, drinking out of a large mug. He seemed despondent and bitter, clothes travel-worn and frayed at the edges. Whatever else he'd done after murdering all those people and leaving his intended victim holding the bag, at least he hadn't seemed to land on his feet.

Good.

Julia touched her hairpin, hoping it'd had time to recharge since the Miller lab. It warmed under her fingers, filling her eyes with the usual traps she'd expect in a tavern this seedy, mostly around the cash boxes and casks of ale. Nothing around Sazed though. 

Even better.

"You taking the lead, Ango?" she asked, keeping her voice low.

"I've got my owl workin'," Merle said. "If he starts lying, I'll cast a quiet Zone of Truth. How's that sound?"

"He’ll know the moment you do, sir," Angus warned him, “which would blow our cover. Let’s save that unless we have no choice.”

Merle knocked on the table with the knuckles of his soulwood arm. "I’m here if ou change your mind."

Magnus fixed his duck pin to Angus's shirtfront, tapping it again to use its charge. "There. You won't have advantage, but you should be able to charm him." He patted Angus on the shoulder. "That's as much as we can stack the deck for you. Do you want one of us to go with you, or wait here as backup."

"I'll go alone at first," Angus said, getting up from the table. "It's less suspicious. But if I need help, I'll stand up. You come first, please, Julia. He's likely to underestimate a woman more than a man or a dwarf."

Julia cracked her knuckles. "He'll only get to make that mistake once."

Angus beamed at her. "That's what I'm counting on. Now, everyone ready? Then let's go."

 

Lucretia stood outside the door to Taako's workshop for a long time without knocking. She knew he was in there. Not because it was loud with his work, or that the lights were on (Taako didn't need lights anymore, holy  _fuck,_ what had happened to–), but because that was...that was just what Taako  _did,_ when he was stressed. He picked a project and worked on it.

It had occurred to her that maybe he had a project back in the dorm he could focus on instead. She just...she thought it had to be this. He had to be here. Even...even altered, as he was, physically and mentally, he was still Taako. She knew Taako.

He would be here.

When Lucretia finally took a deep breath and knocked, Taako didn't respond. She could practically feel the tension radiating from the room. A low, furious growl rumbled through.

Taako was  _definitely_ in there.

"Taako?" Lucretia called, rapping on the door with her knuckles again. "I wanted to talk to you. Did you have a moment?"

After another long silence, Taako said, "I guess I have to, for the Director."

Lucretia didn't...she didn't want to talk to him as the Director. The loneliness that seemed the core of her these days positively ached. She wanted to talk to her friend about what had happened to him while he was...away. She wanted to know how he was, what she could do to help.

She couldn't, of course. Her mission meant too much for that. No matter what else happened, she was in too deep now. They all were.

That didn't mean she couldn't talk to him.

When she pushed the door open, she called light to the Bulwark Staff so she could see the room around her. Someday, when there was time, she wanted to talk to him about his artificing, how he got started, what in the world had drawn him to this secret mastery of his forgotten past. Did he use the same sigils and runes he preferred back when they were all learning this craft together? What had he picked up from Faerun that hadn't been in that long-lost plane?

"Are you gonna say something?" Taako asked from where he was perched on his workbench, goggles down, hands busy with his invisible ink. (Which, truth be told, Lucretia wanted more than anything else he'd made. What a useful thing that would be, if they could figure out a way to sync it to a particular person!) "So far this is feeling pretty ominous, Madam Director. Am I about to be fired? That's a shitty thing to do so close to Candlenights."

"Oh, uh, no," she responded without thinking, just for a moment reverting back to that young girl on the Starblaster, so in awe of him, of all the other members of the crew. Then she straightened, wrapping both hands lightly around the Bulwark Staff. "No, Taako. You haven't done anything wrong, as far as I know." It occurred to her in a flash of dread that there were dozens–hundreds–of ways Taako could get into trouble with only a badger cub to watch over him. "...You haven't, have you, Taako?"

"Plead the fifth," Taako sang, low and distracted. Lucretia winced, perversely glad he couldn't see her. That wasn't a phrase he could have gotten from Faerun. It was a holdover from her journals, one of many she'd caught Magnus and Taako dropping thoughtlessly into conversation. She thought she'd done such a perfect job editing those memories.

Not perfect enough for language, apparently.

"What can I do for you, Director, if you're not here to call me out for something?"

Lucretia pressed her lips together, trying to think of a way to phrase it without seeming abruptly–and unprofessionally–over-invested in him. Surely this was a conversation any employer would have with her subordinate? "Actually, Taako, I thought I might offer my ear to you. I understand you're having a difficult time right now."

The way Taako sat up, lifted his head, turned to her, with such deliberate focus, sent a chill up her spine.

Ah, fuck. She'd tipped him off. Somehow. About  _something._  

"Oh?" Taako said, lifting the arcane goggles up onto his forehead. "Hm. I didn't figure you as the emotionally-invested-employer type. Did you talk to Merle about becoming an amputee before sending him back to the dorm? Magnus and Julia sure went through some shit before you picked them up. Did you talk to them?"

"Merle has been directed to the healers for further discussion of his...new addition," Lucretia said, trying to think of a way back out of whatever she'd stumbled into. "It isn't my intention to pry, Taako. If you don't want to talk about it, of course, you don't have to."

"I'm just not sure why you'd think I want to talk about it with  _my boss,"_  Taako said, chin cradled in his hand while the other rolled his pen thoughtfully on the table.

"I care about every person on this base, Taako," Lucretia said, indefensibly stung by him. She  _knew_ he wouldn't understand. Why had she come here? She usually had better sense than this. There was just– She wanted–

What had  _happened_ to him? Who had Magnus and Merle and Julia gone to arrest? Why was Angus working on this case for Taako? How did they all meet, and how long ago?

What did it mean that Lup had been here once, months ago, and then never again? Where was she now? Where was Barry? Were they together? Surely they were together. Lup had to be with someone, and if she couldn't be with her brother, she  _must_ be with Barry. So where were they?

Why was there so much she didn't know? How could there possibly be so much she didn't–!

"Are you here because secretly  _you_ need an ear?"

Lucretia blinked, refocusing on Taako. Gods above, what was wrong with her? "No," she said, casting her eyes around the room, wondering again how he'd  _made_ all this. Taako was a clever wizard, and by the time she'd met him at the IPRE he'd been among the smartest people she'd ever known. She just...hadn't expected to see proof of it here, with him still under the effects of Fisher's baby. "I want you to trust me, Taako," she admitted. "You already put yourself in so much danger retrieving the Oculus, and you will again for the remaining Relics. I hate to think I'm sending someone into such situations who doesn't even–”

"If this is going to segue into you gently letting me down," Taako snapped, "you can stuff it. I'm not an invalid. And I am  _going_ to go on the next retrieval, whether you want me to or not."

"I'm not trying to stop you," Lucretia insisted, startled by his ferocity. "I know you're more than capable of going on the missions. Your workshop here more than proves your readiness, although I will insist on some training with the others once they get back. It can take a while to locate Relics, as you know, and I will expect you to pass the same physicals they do." She let a smirk curve her mouth, knowing he wouldn't be able to tell. "Also, I doubt you have a focus yet, since you keep, shall we say, disposing of Magnus's offerings."

Taako widened his eyes in an overdone show of innocence. "I feel personally attacked! If Magnus was giving me foci instead of just a bunch of stupid sticks, maybe I wouldn't spend so much time releasing them into the wild."

"Why not turn one of his  _sticks_  into a focus on your own?" Lucretia wondered. She drummed her fingers on his table to indicate the workshop in general. "Clearly you could. Why waste his effort?"

"Uh, because fuck those sticks, that's why." He turned those enormous, blank golden eyes to her, shining with the faint traces of arcane energy that seemed to follow in his wake since he reappeared in her life. "Why do you care?"

"I'm...curious," she admitted. "You don't seem like a particularly wasteful person."

"What the fuck do you know about it?" he said, deceptively even for the poison hidden in his words. "You don't know a thing about me, other than I was stupid enough to sign up to try and save the world when you  _begged_ me to."

Lucretia opened her mouth to snap back that she hadn't  _begged,_ but caught herself just in time. "You're right," she said, smoothing her free hand down the front of her dress. "I don't know you. But I'd like to. That's why I'm here, I suppose. There's clearly something big happening in your life, and I'd like to learn more about it. About you."

Taako blew a lock of hair out of his face, expression deeply unimpressed. "I'm sure you're, like, pretty or whatever," he said, dragging a small cauldron over to start adding ingredients from an assortment of haphazard baskets stacked near him. "You've got a good voice, I guess. But, like, I'm hella gay, so. Pass."

For the first time in nearly a decade, Lucretia's whole face went hot with a furious blush. "Same," she blurted, then immediately cringed.

Confusion crinkled familiar lines between Taako's eyes. "Same?" he echoed. "You're hella gay?"

Lucretia cleared her throat, wanting to fling herself from her own moon base.  _Why_ had she come here? "Yes, but. Perhaps this isn't an appropriate work conversation after all."

"Uh, I think that was my stance before you even got up your courage to knock on the door after standing there for, like, ten minutes." He frowned heavily at her, tossing a handful of aggressively pink flowers into the cauldron. "The fuck, man, if this hasn't all been a shitty fantasy OSHA violation vis a vis hitting on Taako while his friends are arresting and/or killing a murderer, what even are we doing here?"

"They're arresting a  _murderer?"_

Taako flapped a hand through the air. "Can we focus!"

"I am trying to," Lucretia protested. "They didn't disclose they were after a murderer! I would never have permitted–"

"Kind of not your choice though, is it?" Taako began shredding a particularly large leaf into his potion. "If you hadn't agreed to let Ango do his detective thing, he wouldn't've agreed to come work for you If he hadn't agreed, none of the rest of us would either. Who he's chasing or why kinda isn't your business."

Lucretia struggled against her next impulse and failed. She heard herself asking, "Is that how it happened? How you went blind? The murderer did something to you?"

"Another thing that isn't your business," Taako pointed out.

"Is he that Kalen man you...mentioned in the infirmary?"

Pam the badger came lunging out from under Taako's stool, all her teeth bared, her fur puffed large in warning. Lucretia couldn't see any change in Taako's demeanor that could have prompted her attack, but she had clearly set her off. The name, maybe?

Then she noticed the fine tremor in his hands, the otherwise profound stillness of his body, how even his breath was silent. Perhaps someone  _had_ reacted to the name, but it wasn't Pam.

"I'm sorry," Lucretia said, low and soft with her remorse. Sorry for bringing it up, for pushing. Sorry that any of this had happened. That she hadn't  _been_ there, that none of them had been able to protect him. 

Sorry that even now, she couldn't think of any other way of ending the Hunger's hunt once and for all. She couldn't think of a way around this, a future where they were safe but she hadn't had to send him away.

Taako rubbed a hand over his face. He bent carefully to scoop Pam off the ground, keeping her in his lap where she grumbled without struggling. "It's not any of your business," Taako reiterated. "You agreed to take us on and let us do this on the side. It doesn't have anything to do with you. I don't know why you're suddenly the buddy boss, or what you get out of it. And I don't  _care._ I'll do all the training you want to be ready to go after the Relics. Point me at 'em, we'll do a great job. Don't pry into my fucking life, okay? The people I need for that project are already on it. Also," he said, pulling his goggles back down, "don't let the door hit you on the way out."

Well. That had gone– It could've been worse, she decided on her way back to her office. For Taako, that'd been basically polite. She hadn't learned anything she wanted to, which was...not ideal. Still. 

Now she had to figure out who Kalen was.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: what does the gang do with Sazed? And how does Taako react to seeing him again? ALL IMPORTANT QUESTIONS


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I FORGOT. AGAIN.
> 
> Big things happened in Critical Role and I spent three days in a fuge. But I'm back now!
> 
> HERE YOU GO

As soon as they got back to the moon base, Magnus made a beeline for Taako's workshop. Julia and the others were working with Avi to get Sazed moved, and they had decided pretty much unanimously that Magnus should look after Taako.

When he got there, Taako was using a set of tongs to pour an electric green potion into a series of three vials held upright in a hand-carved wooden stand. Wait, no, the first one poured green, then blue, then yellow. Alright, that was weird, but probably not  _the_ weirdest thing he'd seen.

"What are they?" he asked.

Taako jolted, a small motion Magnus only caught because he was looking for it, before carefully setting down the empty cauldron. "Didn't make me that  _knock_ sign I told you to, I guess," he said, pulling off his thick potions gloves. His dexterous fingers dipped into one of his impossibly disorganized baskets to pull out corks. "Fucking figures, man."

"I'm working on another cane," Magnus said cheerfully. "I'll make the sign after."

Once all the potions were corked and sealed, Taako stuck them in his pocket. He peeled off the rest of his gear–goggles, apron–and dumped them on his worktable, then stood with a stretch.

"Have you slept at all?" Magnus demanded.

Taako shrugged. "Sure, while you chucklefucks were at the Miller lab."

"Taako! It's  _dawn,_  you should've gotten some sleep! Or...meditation, whatever. Actual  _rest."_

"You haven't slept in like two days," Taako said. "So shut up. I assume you're here to hide me back in the dorm while the prisoner is moved." He held out an expectant hand. "Chop-chop."

Taako had basically the whole base's layout memorized by now. Not only did he not need help getting back to the dorm, Magnus had specifically stopped himself from offering because he figured, well. Taako, already tense due to, uh, circumstances, treated like an invalid? Yeah, he figured Taako'd curse him. Not just with words, but an actual curse or potion or both, for sure. To have him  _ask_ for an arm...

This was worse than they'd thought.

Magnus obediently tucked Taako's hand into the bend of his arm, waited for Pam to finish up her traditional greeting of trying to maul his boots to death (she was getting pretty good at it!), and walked with Taako toward the elevator that would take them down to their dorm. His timing, all things being equal, could have been a  _touch_ better. Just as they made it to the main quad, they were joined by another group.

Julia, marching a shackled Sazed to the brig, with Merle and Angus walking behind her, expressions hard.

Because it was just how their lives worked, Sazed spotted Magnus first. Well. He spotted  _Taako_ first, before Julia had the chance to wrench him away. The human's face twisted with a dark and bitter smile. "Well, well," he called. "If it isn't  _Taako from TV._ Wasn't expecting to find a murderer in a place like this! _"_

Julia grabbed his shirt to give him a hard shake. "There wasn't one until  _you_ got here, you fucking creep!"

"Can't even defend himself anymore, huh?" Sazed snorted. "That figures. He never did anything when he could make someone else do it for him. He even had to outsource the end of that shitty show!"

Taako's hand clenched hard around Magnus's arm, fingers digging into his skin, whole body shaking. Instead of replying, he turned his head away. "I need you to get me out of here," he said, so low even Magnus nearly didn't hear him. So desperate it made his heart ache. 

Magnus scowled at Sazed and spun to yank Taako in the other direction. Unprepared for the sudden motion, Taako stumbled, unseeing eyes wide, free hand flung out to try and brace himself. Magnus caught him with a hissed apology, steadying him with a hand touched just between his shoulder blades.

Sazed laughed, a sharp, cutting sound. "Oh this is  _rich!_  Are you fucking  _blind?_  You vain piece of shit,  _no one_ could deserve it more. I only with I'd thought to do that instead of kill you! Would’ve saved me a lot of–"

"Too late," Taako sighed. "You should've been faster, Magnus." 

Before anyone could figure out what he meant, Taako dug into his pocket for not one, but all three potions, one between each finger of his right hand. He pulled back and  _hurled,_  catching Sazed in the chest with the whole lot.

Immediately, Sazed began screaming.

"The only person here who deserves to suffer is you, you worthless shitty  _asshole!"_ Taako shouted, lunging toward his one-time assistant. Magnus caught him around the waist on instinct alone. Pam immediately charged at Sazed, savaging him from the calf down. "If you wanted a show so badly you should have made your  _own!_  Forty people are dead because you can't even get a murder right! You're lucky I need your guilty ass in court or I would turn you to  _ash!_ "

Oh. Taako wasn't  _afraid_  of Sazed. He was afraid of  _killing_ Sazed.

Magnus picked Taako up, tossing him over one shoulder. 

"I am going to find and ruin  _everything you love!"_  Taako shrieked at the screaming traitor behind them. "Once you're done clearing my name I will make you regret fucking me over! I will peel your skin to use in a potion, I give  _no shits!"_

"What did those potions do?" Magnus asked when Taako finally wound down.

He could  _feel_ the malicious satisfaction that radiated off Taako. "Blind, burn, boils. One of them wears off in an hour. One wears off in a day. One might not wear off  _ever_ depending on how he fucking rolls."

"Which one's which?"

"Depends on how he fucking rolls," Taako said again, low and spiteful.

That was some scary shit, to be honest.

Once they got where they were going, Magnus set Taako back on his feet. "We're here!"

Taako blinked out of his rage, ears flickering as he tried to figure out where they were. "This isn't the dorm," he realized. 

Magnus patted him on the back. "Nah. You're too pissed for that, you'll, like, burn down the kitchen. This is the training room!" He walked in, pleased when Taako followed carefully behind him. There wasn't a sound or feeling when Taako activated his field, but he held himself differently, with more confidence, maybe, or just more purpose.

Wait, though, if he was only activating it now...

"How did you hit that asshole with those potions?" Magnus asked, amazed and delighted. "He was so far away!"

"He is loud as fuck," Taako sniffed, hands on his hips, expression full of disgust. "I could have got him in a crowded room. You should have taken me with when you arrested him, I'd've just put him to sleep."

"Do you have a potion for that?"

"Buddy, at this point, I have a potion for  _everything."_ He tilted his head to one side in that particular way that meant he was examining the way his field interacted with the room around him. "I gotta get some anchors in here," he realized. "This is a big space."

Magnus hopped a bit so Taako could feel how bouncy the floor was. "It's perfect for practicing, like, the violence that keeps us alive!"

"Huh." Taako shook his wrists so the bracelets there would rattle. "Well, this is convenient. Madam Director told me I should work with you guys a bunch before the next Relic anyway."

Something...quiet, and dangerous, and cold settled on Magnus's shoulders. "The Director? When did you talk to her?"

Taako shrugged, digging through the pouch he wore on his belt these days. "She came by to talk not long after you all went down to the surface."

"Huh. That's weird." Magnus realized his fists were clenched. "We all asked her to leave you alone for a bit."

"She didn't hurt me," Taako scoffed, producing a small squirt bottle of something suspiciously yellow. "She just sounded curious. It's not her fucking show though so I shut that down pretty quick. Pam sure doesn't seem to like her though." He turned and spritzed Magnus dead in the face. "Wanna try an experiment?"

Magnus was coughing too hard to reply.

"Yeah next time don't breath it in. Are we gonna test this shit or what?"

As it turned out, the...spray was an arcane...juice? Or something. It put magic on stuff that wasn't inherently magical so Taako could track it. Magnus ran around the training room, hiding behind obstacles, jumping out to try and surprise Taako, but as long as the stuff was still on his face, Taako knew where he was. Which he proved by flicking Magnus in the forehead–or the butt–with Mage Hand. It took the elf a bit to get used to tracking the arcane residue, or whatever, and it seemed to cause him a headache that took a sharp turn toward exhaustion after a few rounds, but. Hell.

This was  _awesome._

Of course, there was room for improvement. Things Magnus noted for work on later–tomorrow, maybe, or the day after, depending on how wiped everyone felt. Taako was real stationary when he fought, even for a caster. With all his focus on the field, his, kind of, physical awareness dropped down to basically nothing. He turned toward Magnus in an automatic sort of way, probably tracking the ripple of Magnus moving through the field more than Magnus himself. With training, Taako could rely more on his other senses, too, bringing his field back in as more of a personal warning system.

Maybe it'd be less exhausting to use that way. Another possible perk, Magnus thought, slinging Taako across his back after he crumpled to the ground at the end of their session. "Do you think you could track Julia's Hunter's Mark?" he asked, heading back to the dorm with his elven backpack.

"Dunno," Taako slurred, halfway to sleep already, head resting heavily against the side of Magnus's neck. "I wanna try that later. I think probably I could. We're gonna be  _awesome._ Probably we can...get Pam to help..."

"Sure thing, buddy," Magnus chuckled. Instead of putting Taako in his own room–nobody went into Taako's room but Taako, and Magnus felt weird going in without permission, even for this–he carefully laid the elf on their big couch. Once he was sure Taako would settle and keep sleeping, he snuck around for a big fluffy blanket to tuck him in. Then he pulled up a seat, took out his decoy cane, and got working. 

Taako was still asleep by the time Julia and the others got back. Angus, who was real little to have stayed up all night, detective or no, almost immediately climbed onto the couch with Taako. Julia pulled up a corner of the blanket for him to snuggle under. He conked out between one breath and the next, curled up in the bend of Taako's knees. Julia made a cooing sound, setting Pam on the couch so she could nest in the hollow of Taako's stomach, and then Magnus wished he knew a painter so they could capture the resulting image for posterity. It was so cute he almost couldn't stand it.

"I'm gonna puke," Merle said on his way to the kitchen.

Aw, he thought it was sweet too.

For about the next twenty-four hours, not one of the five of them did anything meaningful at all. Magnus enforced a strict break, and sure, maybe that meant Taako exacted revenge for being banned from his workshop via making Angus pull pranks on the entire rest of the dorm, but it was worth it. After that reprieve, Magnus got them to work.

In the training room.

The Director shouldn't have bothered Taako when they told her not to–Taako was theirs to worry about, not hers, that was basically written into their contracts–but she had a point about training. Each Relic had been noticeably more difficult to collect than the last. If that was a trend, they were going to have to be better. Faster. More in-sync. And with Taako able to fight and move around at the same time. Magnus started taking special supplemental lessons with Carey, and used the rest of his free time to corral his team into assorted drills. They would work together  _or else._

And if all the physical exertion kept him from constantly looping back to the dark suspicion wanting to build in him, well. Maybe that was for the best, for now. 

(What had the Director wanted from Taako? Why couldn't she wait until after they arrested Sazed to ask them, or Sazed himself? It was Angus's investigation, why didn't she ask  _him?_  Taako was the most vulnerable one out of them all when it came to talking about this stuff. It meant more, hurt him more, and he didn't need every curious person on the moon dragging that trauma out of him  _especially_ when Magnus wasn't there to protect him. Or, like, Julia or Merle or Angus. Someone who had seen Taako back then, who'd had to look this bullshit in the face and put him back together. No one who hadn't been personally cried on by Taako could ask him about this stuff. And if the Director tried again, he'd– Well.)

Anyway, so after they'd been training for a while, Magnus figured it was about time to spring another cane on Taako. He caught the elf in his workshop with Angus, lights out, sitting cross-legged together on a thick blanket, knees almost touching. Taako hands were cupped under Angus's. Angus's hands were cupped under a little flicker of fire. The boy looked amazed, eyes huge behind his glasses, whole face alight with something like wonder.

"Basic fire stuff like this isn't hard," Taako said. "Remember, it's the intent. You can turn this into Create Bonfire or Fire Bolt or any of the other fire cantrips based on what you want to learn and what you want to do. There's also–"

"Holy shit," Magnus blurted. "Are you teaching him  _magic?"_

Taako jolted so hard he knocked the fire right out of Angus's hands. His expression went from surprised, to frightened, straight on into pissed. "You  _fucker,"_ he growled, twisting one hand through the air in Magnus's direction. The little fire Angus was frantically trying to pat out on the carpet twisted too, snaking through the air at Taako's command to consume the decoy staff in Magnus's hands.

"Aw," he grumbled at it fell to ash. "That was the best one yet! I put a bunch of ducks on it, you like ducks."

"Yeah, they're great with a cherry glaze. Fucking  _knock,_ Magnus, what have I said!"

"How long have you two been working on this?" Magnus asked, crossing the workshop to plop down with his buddies. Luckily, he knew the layout well enough that it didn't even matter that it was stupid dark. Angus leaned over with a shy smile to pull over a big picnic basket.

"Hey, no," Taako complained, yanking the basket close. "He doesn't get any, he didn't  _knock!"_

Angus drooped. "Aw, sir. I worked real hard on it!"

Magnus plucked the basket from Taako's hold, ignoring the way he hissed in fury. "You make Ango cook? Dude, you're a full-on professional, why would you make him do that?"

"I'm a professional wizard too," Taako spat, taking a juice box when Magnus passed him one. "Does that mean I shouldn't make him practice  _magic?"_ He stabbed the straw at the top of the box repeatedly before getting it in, then sipped with a kind of malice Magnus found both alarming and precious.

"Taako offered to teach me a few weeks ago," Angus said, holding his hands out for a sandwich and juice box. "Oh, wait!" He pulled the basket close enough to dig around, producing an oil lap. Once it was carefully placed, he caught his tongue between his teeth and concentrated. A little flame blossomed on the wick. "I did it!" Angus cheered.

"Yeah, sure, great." Taako stuffed a sandwich in his mouth. "You two chucklefucks can clear out right now, I'm busy."

"Aw, but sir!" Angus made a really sad face for Magnus's benefit, pitching his voice  _super_ sad for Taako's. "But then I won't get to see the real staff Magnus's made you instead of all those goof canes. I've been so curious!"

"You little brat!" Magnus yelped. "How'd you  _know?"_

Angus adjusted his glasses but didn't reply. There was a  _devious_ glint in his eyes, though, Magnus just knew it.

Taako turned to Magnus, both ears pricked high with interest. "The  _real_ staff?"

Magnus heaved a put-upon sigh. "Yeah  _okay,_ I guess it's close enough to ready."

At first, Magnus had genuinely made a beautifully hand-carved cane he was sure Taako would love. When Taako hated it, he'd been confused and, yeah, a little hurt. Julia had been the one to help him understand that, to Taako, the cane was a symbol of his disability. A cane was a tool blind people and only blind people used to navigate the world. Whether or not that was actually true, it was what Taako felt, and that. Yeah, that was understandable. After that, Magnus carved basic canes because watching Taako destroy them was  _hilarious._

In the meantime, with Merle's help and the use of the moon bases's thinner but still impressive library, Magnus made a staff. A proper wizard's staff for a bomb-ass transmutation wizard. Merle had grown a real thin little tree just like Magnus needed, with hollows Magnus spent months seeding with the clearest quartz he could get his hands on. The result was a twisting staff of wood and crystal like a living geode. Magnus had really,  _really_ wanted to carve some embellishments but Julia had intervened before he got even the first badger on there.  _Keep it simple,_ she'd said. So, fine.

Taako's network almost certainly would have picked up the staff, so Magnus kept it hidden in Merle's greenhouse on the moon base. He grabbed it from its hiding spot and brought it back to the workshop.

He knew Taako loved it by the way he didn't say a word when Magnus set it in his hands. For a long moment, he seemed to go away, like he did when he was checking on his networks, gone inside the magic.

"It's beautiful," Angus whispered, coming over to tuck in close by Magnus's side so they could watch Taako explore the staff together.

"Thanks," Magnus whispered back. "I hope he doesn't chuck this one into space too, it took a while."

Taako's magic lit the staff, curling down the crystal spiral, white and then red and then blue, transmuting the heart of the wood.

"I don't think he will," Angus said with a smile.

When Taako refocused on them, he blinked rapidly a few times. "It's okay, I guess," he said, slightly choked. 

Magnus and Angus grinned at each other.

Success!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: Refuge :3c And maybe some bonus Kravitz!


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fucking HELL forgot AGAIN
> 
> To apologize! I'll put another chapter up tomorrow. SORRY! This whole thing is written, I don't know why I keep forgetting!

The Seekers found another Relic, and Taako was  _ready._

Taako had been fucking ready for  _ages._  Someone had possessed Magnus with the ghost of a drill sergeant or something, and at this point Taako thought the only way to get out of training was to 1) die or 2) get sent after another one of those stupid-powerful magical artifacts. None of the others would ever let him live it down if he died in a training exercise, so Relic hunting it was.

It hadn't been all bad. Taako hadn't had to talk to the Director again, and the rest of the team seemed unusually peeved with her, which was hilarious. All Magnus's obsessive training meant Taako was in  _kickass_ battle shape. Pam was finally big enough to come with them, and she was amazing at following Julia's commands.

As a bonus. Taako had achieved his goal of catching the Director's staff in his field a few more times. He'd checked it out with his arcane goggles, too. Once they found the next Relic–the Temporal Chalice–Taako would be able to examine it for comparison. By now, he was nearly certain the Director's staff was, itself, a Relic, but...

If he wasn't  _positive,_ he couldn't tell the others. There wouldn't be a point. Even  _with_ certainty, what did it mean, that she had one? What did it mean that she would destroy the others but not this one?

They'd signed on with the BoB to do good. Well–Taako signed on because there was money in it, and safety, and a workshop with access to a ton of rare and valuable components. But the others thought they were doing real good here. Helping destroy genuinely bad, evil artifacts. Basically everyone else in the organization seemed to think that too. But really, they only had the Director's word on that.

So what if she was lying? What if she wasn't destroying them?

What if she was keeping them?

Once Taako had more proof, he could go to the others. Or, actually, maybe he'd start with Angus. Angus could take Taako's suspicions and actually do something with them. He could discover if they'd jumped out of a Kalen-shaped frying pan into a Director-shaped–

Taako touched the dove hairpin. Calm washed through him, bringing his racing heart back down to a reasonable beat. He drew in a deep breath, blowing out hard to try and chase away his thoughts.

Later.

Magnus came and got him, and they went down to Refuge. They fought some purple worms, which turned out to be babies (oops). Avi loaded them into a cannon and shot them through a time bubble that had, apparently, been put up and sustained by the Relic.

Everything got really weird for a long time. Or, well. It got weird for about an hour, but over and over. Pam didn't seem to notice; she treated each loop like the first (she  _really_ wanted to eat Roswell. Not just the bird part. All the red elemental clay, too.). That was probably for the best. Remembering wasn't really doing the rest of them any favors. 

Still, they figured it out. They found the worm, and the temple, and the Stonefruit gang. Taako got his hands on a journal that he tossed to Julia, who got Roswell under her command in the nick of time. They met Istus, who made them her emissaries and gave them gifts (a bubble-popping lance for Magnus, a 9-second do-over ball that Merle was  _sure_ to use well, a quiver of blessed arrows for Julia, a set of little golden claw-caps for Pam, and a bag that would eventually be useful for Taako), and finally started a loop they might actually be able to break out of.

They found the cup. It had an offer for them.

Taako opened his eyes, and he could see. He was in a...it looked like a tavern. The Davy Lamp, maybe, it was the only tavern in–

Taako could  _see it._ He could see the bar and the piano and the tables and the–

June was there, the little girl, holding an ornate silver cup. Taako turned in his seat and–

Magnus was there. He was. Tall, and had brown hair, hazel eyes. Julia was beautiful, she was– She had warm skin the color of wet earth and gray eyes and hair that gleamed in the lamplight and– Merle had–  _flowers_ in his beard and–

Pam was there and she had stripes and–

Taako's heart felt like it was going to explode. He made a desperate sound, clinging to his dove pin for–

He saw the pins he'd made the others, they didn't look terrible they looked  _amazing,_ they were gorgeous he'd done such a great–

"Holy fuck," Merle said, leaf green eyes widening in alarm. He grabbed Taako's wrist to pump Calm Emotions into him and with the arcane glasses on the spell was made of  _light_ and  _color_ and–

Taako sobbed. He didn't mean to. He couldn't help it.

"Are you doing this?" Magnus snapped at June, at the Chalice, yanking Taako into a protective, smothering hold. Taako could see each thread in his shirt, faint stains and mended tears. All of his friends were so beautiful how had he not known–

"No," the Chalice said.

"Can you see?" Julia breathed, eyes vibrant and enormous and Taako wanted to learn how to paint just so he could spend ten years learning to get them exactly right. "Can you see us?"

"That's impossible," Merle snapped. "The damage was left too long, nobody could heal–"

"His eyes have not been healed," the Chalice said. "This is a world outside of the physical. Outside of reality. He is as he remembers himself, here. As he wills himself." She met Taako's gaze, intent even through his tears. "I have an offer for you."

The Chalice tempted them in a way no other Relic had. It showed Taako that awful day in Glamour Springs, showed Sazed poisoning the chicken. If Sazed hadn't killed all those people, the magistrate would never have come after him. If Kalen hadn't come after him, Taako would be...a totally different person. Free. Whole. Back to that perfect self he'd been so long ago. He could go back and change this moment, change everything. Kill Sazed before that fucker could ruin everything Taako loved.

And all he had to do was take up the Chalice.

"There are rules," the Chalice said. "If you take me, you'll have to dedicate yourself to maintaining the new timeline. Good or bad, you'll have to want it. And you can't do then what you're doing now, it'll be too hard to keep up the change. That means no Bureau of Balance, no hunting for the Relics. No meeting each other. You have to decide quickly, though. What'll it be?"

"Pass," Merle said instantly. "I don't need to look back to fix my mistakes. I can do that moving forward."

"I would...love to be able to go back," Julia said softly, rubbing a hand over her eyes. "To save my mother. But..." She shrugged helplessly. "What's done is done. I learned from it. It's a no from me, too."

"Maybe I could have stopped Kalen way earlier." Magnus looked away, mouth pressed into a hard, thin line. "Saved a bunch of people. It could have gone a lot worse, though." He shook his head. "Me neither. Pass."

Everyone turned to Taako. He watched them look at him, saw them realizing what he would lose–what he would go back to–if he said no. He felt like he was going to throw up. Gods, he was going to–he was gonna puke right here in this vision, or whatever it was.

"I," he said, voice tight and shrill, rocking on his stool. He couldn't say no. He  _couldn't_ say no. "I–"

Julia took his hand. She smiled at him– _fuck_  she had such a great smile, how had he never known–! "It's okay," she said softly, squeezing his fingers. "We understand, Taako. You have to..." Her lower lip wobbled. "You have to do what's right for you. We love you, and we couldn't possibly judge you for it. Make your own choice, okay? Make it for you."

Magnus nodded, face twisted in pain. He looked agonized, he had such an expressive–

Why would Magnus be hurting? What would Taako saying yes possibly do to–

Oh shit, fuck,  _fuck._  Taako had warned Magnus about Kalen bombing Raven's Roost. Julia hadn't been with him at the inn, she must have been back in town. If Kalen hadn't arrested Taako, hadn't kept him, Taako wouldn't have known about the attack.  _Magnus_ wouldn't have known. Julia would have been– And Pam, she, in the forest, she would have–

Taako whined, high in the back of his throat. He leaned forward, pressing his forehead hard against the tabletop. He couldn't look at them. He couldn't speak. He screwed his eyes shut tight.

And shook his head.

"Well, I can't say I'm not disappointed. None of you will change your mind? Hmm. How about if you see what happened, back then? If you're forced to confront it? Maybe one of you will change your mind."

She dropped them in a new place, a familiar place. Taako didn't scream, but it was close.

Kalen's lab. The attic apothecary.

The day they brought him back from his escape. 

"You're a sick fuck," Merle said, disgusted and furious.

Magnus grabbed Taako, pressing him hard into his chest. "Don't look," he whispered. "Try not to listen. Pretend...pretend you're somewhere else, okay? She's weak. This can't last long."

It lasted long enough.

She showed them the guards, throwing Taako into the room, already bloodied from the way they'd treated him all the way back. Taako remembered hitting the ground, every inch of him in pain, knowing it would get worse before the end and not...not being able to do anything about it. The potions weirdo hadn't treated him any different, just got him working on another batch of cauldrons. The sun set.

Kalen came.

Taako remembered how angry he'd been at himself all day, how stupid he'd felt, to let himself be caught. He shouldn't have given that guy a warning, shouldn't have traveled anywhere near someplace he'd known Kalen's forces would be. What an  _idiot,_ to care that much about strangers.

When Kalen got there, he was eerily calm. He dismissed the potions weirdo, and Taako's stomach turned to ice. Once the weirdo was gone, Kalen...

Kalen went  _berserk._

He screamed, hurling obscenities and vicious names at Taako, frothing at the mouth almost from the word go. He set hands on the nearest cauldron, just a small one full of a boiling base that could be turned into any number of other potions based on–

Somehow, Taako hadn't thought he'd throw it.

The base burned across his face, acid and heat eating at his skin. Taako made an animal noise as he fell, terrified and in agony, the worst pain he'd ever felt. Kalen was on him in an instant, beating him, breaking flesh and bones with just his bare hands, and Taako was so sure he would die–

"Stop it!" Julia shouted. Taako could hear her even over the thundering of Magnus's heart. "You evil piece of shit!  _Stop it!"_

"Will you say yes?" the Chalice asked. "You could make it so this never happens."

"I will never give in to you," Julia growled. Taako's whole body felt like it was made of static. "None of us will!"

"So be it," the Chalice said. The quality of the air changed. Something metallic hit the ground and rolled.

"We did it," Magnus said, resigned and exhausted. Taako opened his eyes.

Everything was dark.

Taako kept it together. He didn't...falter, or drag them down. He wasn't a burden. They got through the mines. They reunited the worms. They freed the town, and met back up with all the happy townspeople. Ren made a point of telling Taako how much she still admired him. Taako thought she'd do real well for herself in the world, now that she was back in it, and told her so.

He wondered what she looked like.

He kept it together.

When they got back to the moon base, Magnus and Merle and Julia told him to go to bed. They'd take care of the rest. Taako touched his dove pin.

He went back to the dorm.

He hung up his cloak. He set his staff against the wall. And he–

collapsed.

Taako sunk to the floor, breath heaving in his chest, fighting the sobs building under his lungs but not– He couldn't– Tears were already dripping down his cheeks and he just–

"Uh," someone–a stranger–said from the direction of their couch. "Is now a bad time?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So! Who do you think that could possibly bbbeeeeeeeeee~


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> KABLAM, second chapter in two days. Sorry I keep forgetting!
> 
> More on Friday. ...Probably

When the elf collapsed, Kravitz panicked. In a dignified manner befitting a reaper of the Raven Queen, of course. But.

Yes.

Panicked.

He'd only come to the moon base to check in with those goobers from the Miller lab. Julia had sworn on their behalf that there would be no more dying from her husband or the dwarf. Except there  _was_ more dying. A lot more dying.

From Julia, too. She'd seemed so sensible.

After being lenient on them, all the additional deaths required investigation. So Kravitz had tracked them here, to their dorm on the moon, where apparently they weren't, at the moment. It would've been smarter to come back later, but–

He was already here. He might as well wait.

Then the elf came home.

He...wasn't expecting the elf. With tangled golden hair, slumped shoulders, lowered eyes, he looked haggard. Exhausted. But, uh. He.

Even still, he was kind of gorgeous.

Maybe this wouldn't be such a boring check-up after all.

Kravitz straightened out of his slouch, watching with interest as the elf hung up his cloak and rested a beautiful staff against the wall. Oh, the elf hadn't noticed him yet, that was okay he could–

The elf collapsed. Crumpled to the ground with a heaving gasp. Wait, fuck, it was a sob, the elf was  _crying._

Kravitz popped to his feet, instantly unsure about what his plan should be. Leave? Try to help? Ask the elf if he wanted help or to be left alone? It was too late to pretend he wasn't here, he had to do  _something._ He opened his mouth to say something clever, something to defuse the situation.

What came out was, "Uh, is now a bad time?"

Shit. Well, that was just–

The elf jerked back, eyes wide, shocked as though he hadn't even realized Kravitz was in the room with him. He lashed a hand out for his staff, casting as spell almost immediately. Black tentacles burst into existence underneath Kravitz, holding him tight.

"Oh, come on," he complained, trying to save against them but failing kind of miserably. He ignored the blush rising on his cheeks and hoped the elf would be decent enough to do the same. "I'm just here to ask a few questions!"

"Who are you?" the elf snapped, pointing his staff at Kravitz with a vicious expression. He was crouched against the wall, in among all the coattails. Tears slid down his cheeks untouched. The staff was shaking.  _He_ was shaking.

"Are you okay?" Kravitz asked as it began to dawn on him that something  _bad_ had happened here.

"What's your name, thug?" the elf snarled. "I'm about to tentacle your  _dick!"_

Kravitz frowned even as his blush got hotter. "That's really not necessary!"

"What's not necessary is having a stranger in my  _house!_ Who are you!  _Who fucking sent you?_ "

Before Kravitz could reply, the elf tipped over from angry to something worse. He fell back hard against the wall, gasping so desperately each breath was reduced to a wheeze. One hand darted up to grab a beautiful dove pin in his hair, pulling it so hard he nearly tore it free. His eyes were huge and blank, unseeing in his panic. Or, wait– Holy fuck.

"Shit," Kravitz blurted, "I didn't know– Uh, I'm Kravitz, I met your friends at the Miller lab, I just came to–"

But it was too late. The elf with the dove pin was gone, lost in himself. Kravitz didn't know– He–

Usually, when someone was having a panic attack in front of Kravitz, it was because he'd come to pass judgement on them, and they knew there was no getting out of it. In situations like that, the easiest way to get them to calm down was to separate them from their bodies. With no heart or lungs or neurochemicals to get in the way, a soul's ability to talk rationally about a bad situation just skyrocketed. Here, though? Now? Not a winning strategy.

So he couldn't just murder Dove Pin Elf. The paperwork alone would be, just, crippling, to say nothing of the Raven Queen's disappointment. Trapped in tentacles, though, his options where somewhat limited. Not that Dove Pin would probably welcome a stranger's touch right now anyway, but–

What  _could_ he do?

Dove Pin was curled up, now, wrapped around his staff, face hidden in his arms, ears pinned back so hard they had to hurt. His whole body was heaving with each half-swallowed sob. Kravitz hadn't been alive in such a long, long time. He didn't remember what it felt like to be desperate for air, to have his body turn against him like that. Didn't remember ever being so lost. This shouldn't mean anything to him, he didn't even know Dove Pin's  _name_. All the same, he...made Kravitz's slumbering heart ache.

Without thinking about it, without even realizing he'd started, Kravitz was humming. It crackled out brokenly, a tuneless, clumsy attempt at something comforting. Slowly, it morphed into a series of nonsense scales, catching on a note here or there until– He was singing, voice low and brittle with disuse, an old lullaby from a bygone age, something he didn't even remember ever learning. Long-forgotten bardic magic swelled in his lungs, spun out in each word until Dove Pin's breath started to come easier, until his shaking stopped. Until the black tentacles faded away and Kravitz was left crouching on the floor, watching Dove Pin slowly melt out of his distress.

"There you are, dove," he murmured when the elf finally, finally began to uncurl. "I'm sorry for scaring you. I came to talk to Julia. I think you've had something of a difficult day, hm?"

"'M not a fucking  _baby,"_ Dove Pin snapped in a warbling, furious voice. He scrubbed a hand over his face, using the other to drag himself up his staff and pointedly ignoring the way his lower lip kept trying to wobble. "Who the  _fuck_ are you?"

"I'm Kravitz," he said, watching the elf steady himself against the wall, looking exhausted and angry about it. "I'm a reaper in the court of the Raven Queen."

Dove Pin blinked. He shook his head, more to clear it than in disagreement. A flash of...something... ran up Kravitz's legs, over his whole body, a shiver of awareness that raised the hair on his arms in completely needless chicken skin. "...Huh," the elf said. He sniffled aggressively and pulled the sagging pin out of his hair to tuck it in his pocket. "Never, uh. Never had anything like you here before."

"I doubt you ever will again," Kravitz agreed as he finally straightened. He looked around, making note of all the sigils and runes. "Oh! Did you set up a network of some kind? To detect, what, arcane energy? Clever," he noted.

"Don't patronize me," Dove Pin said, sulky as he began shuffling away from the front door. He wavered, knees trembling alarmingly. Once again Kravitz reacted without thinking, darting across the space between them to touch a steadying hand to Dove Pin's elbow. The elf froze, even his lungs still for a long moment. Then he seemed to will himself to relax, tilting his chin up defiantly. "Julia said you were hot, when she talked about you. About meeting you in the Miller lab." He wound his hand into the crook of Kravitz's arm. "Is it true?"

Kravitz felt that useless blush flare up again. "Uh."

Dove Pin lifted his free hand. "I'm a professional, are you going to let me find out or not?"

"I don't even know your name," Kravitz said a little weakly. 

"Taako."

"Uh, nice to–"

"You're stalling. Am I checking you out to confirm Julia's story? Or are you lying to me about who you are?"

"Those aren't the only two options," Kravitz protested. "But, sure, if it'll make you feel better, you can–HEY!" Kravitz jerked away from the hand firmly attached to his rear end. "That's not–!"

"Hm." Taako shrugged, eyes widened in  _clearly_ fake sincerity, long lashes still clumped with tears. "I guess Julia was right."

"That is  _not_ my face!"

Taako stepped away from him, moving toward the kitchen with a grace Kravitz didn't expect. "Never said what I was gonna check, homie. She didn't say you were  _pretty,_ she said you were hot. Well, I guess what she said was  _cute,_ but." He waved a hand dismissively. "My cunning test checked for that too. You passed. Lucky for you, I was gonna blow you to pieces. You can't just  _appear places,_ dude, that's hella rude."

"I needed to talk to Julia," Kravitz protested, following Taako into the kitchen. "She said she'd make sure nobody added any deaths to their count and they just shot up again! I'm the Grim Reaper, Taako, I have to check in on these things."

"Do you want some tea?" Taako asked, rummaging through the cabinets. "I'm making some tea. Fuck, do I need tea."

"Taako," Kravitz said as firmly as he could while Taako set up a tray with two mugs and put a kettle on to boil. "Where is Julia? I need to ask her–"

"It's not a big deal, thug. We went after another one of those powerful artifacts, and this one did time instead of crystals. We got stuck in a loop for a bit, broke out, now everything's fine. Istus set it right." He half turned toward Kravitz. "You didn't notice all those people in Refuge coming back into circulation? Tell the Raven Queen to ask Istus. Turns out we did it for her as much as anyone."

Kravitz leaned his hip against the counter, arms crossed, watching Taako thoughtfully. He could be lying. He seemed like he'd be a good liar, with how quickly he projected a normal front over the emotional mess that had to still be rolling under his skin. Still, this had just enough truth to it that he thought he should probably check into it a little before arresting anyone. Or reaping anyone. Or. However it went down.

Taako handed him a mug of tea. "Is this gonna turn into a big thing or nah? If we're gonna have a showdown I demand at least a short rest. The day has been shit enough already, my dude. Taako's earned a bath before he's subjected to murderin' by a handsome stranger."

A brief mental image of that bath popped into Kravitz's head, just enough so he choked on his tea. "I have a few more questions," Kravitz managed to say over Taako's snickering.

"That sounds boring," Taako said. "At best, I'll trade you. Answer for answer, my dude. And I just told you about Refuge so it's your turn."

"I don't think," Kravitz began.

"Great, sounds good," Taako interrupted him. "Me next." Kravitz braced himself. "How'd you get into our dorm?"

Kravitz relaxed with a sigh. "Oh, that. That's easy." 

Taako frowned basically right at him. "I've got this place locked up pretty tight, fella. Nobody should be able to just waltz in. I need to know how you did it so I can fix the hole."

"If it helps,” Kravitz said, taking a small sip of his tea, “only a reaper could do it.”

“Doesn’t help at all,” Taako informed him with a dismissive sniff. “Tell me,”

Kravitz summoned his scythe, considering how best to explain. As soon as it materialized, Taako jolted, eyes wide, tea sloshing over his hand. He set his mug down and reached across the table, fingers stretching for the blade. Kravitz frowned. “How did you know—“

“Stay right there,” Taako snapped, bustling from the room. “Don’t move!”

“Uh,” Kravitz said to the empty kitchen. Without anything else to do, he set his scythe down and focused on his tea. An herbal blend, not something he’d had before, but still good.

Fuck, this had turned into an awkward chore. Maybe he could just leave. But…just showing up here had really thrown Taako off. It didn’t seem fair to abandon him without a proper explanation.

Taako came back. He’d changed into loose, flowing pants and tight top. His long hair was twisted back into a low ponytail. And he had a pair of glasses in hand that he perched on his nose as soon as he got back to the table.

…Wasn’t Taako blind?

“Uh,” Kravitz said again.

Taako’s eyes didn’t focus on the scythe. They didn’t really seem to focus on anything. So why was he wearing glasses?

Kravitz pulled up his true form, letting flesh melt away. He looked at Taako through the glowing red eyes of a reaper—of  _the_ Grim Reaper, more powerful than any other being in the Raven Queen’s court. The world tinged with red, a new layer that showed him more about a person than any physical body.

There was death, when he looked at Taako. Not as many as Merle or Magnus, but— Trips untaken to the Astral Plane, all the same. He saw the strange layering that must be that loop Taako mentioned.

And he saw the sigils written into Taako’s glasses, glowing bright in his astral vision.

“Oh,” he blurted thoughtlessly, “you made arcane sight glasses! But how does that work with–?”

Taako jerked, looking like Kravitz had pulled him out of deep thought. He blinked at the reaper, then his eyes widened in surprise. “Whoa,” he breathed, propping one hand on the table so he could lean far enough over it to just brush the bone of Kravitz’s skeletal cheek. “How’re you doing this?”

“Uh!” Kravitz fought the urge to squirm, letting Taako’s fingers—soft, a strangely delicate touch for the force of his personality—glide over his skull. “I’m…the Grim Reaper? This is, uh, actually my true form. The other one is a construct that I—“

“Show me,” Taako demanded.

“…We, um.” Kravitz drew a wholly unnecessary breath. “We had a…deal? It’s. It’s your turn to. Share.”

“You never told me how you got in here,” Taako reminded him, poking once at his forehead.

“I tore a rift with the scythe from the Astral Plane to here and stepped through. Follow-up questions are still questions and you have to wait to ask them. Your turn.”

Taako rolled his eyes and flopped back in his seat, snagging his tea and pushing the arcane glasses up on top of his head. “Okay,  _fine_. What do you want to know?”

Kravitz telegraphed his movements as much as he could, letting his cloak rustle more than usual as he carefully reached over to take the arcane glasses. Taako tensed a little but didn’t flinch or shy away, which, actually, felt like a win. “Where did you get these?” he asked, holding them up to his eyes. Whoa, that was a lot of information. All colors and glowing. “I wanna change my question,” he amended immediately. “Not to be rude, but this is a lot of visual information to process. How do you use them? When you’re, uh…”

“Blind isn’t a bad word,” Taako said dryly, arms and legs crossed in some of the most closed body language Kravitz had ever witnessed. “It’s a  _fact._ The arcane energies look like light and shit to sighted people because that’s how your brain or whatever skeletons have is wired. You  _expect_ something visual. But really that’s just one way of interpreting extra-sensory information and it doesn’t  _have_ to be that way.”

“So what do you, uh, see? Interpret? What do the glasses show you?”

Taako looked away, whole body coiled so tight Kravitz was sure he’d refuse to answer. Then, all at once, he sighed, muscles relaxing until he almost seemed to melt. “…It’s a lot of warmth,” he admitted, low and still faced away. “Or the…expectation of heat. The lack of it. A sense that something is taking up space, or missing from it. A bright enough thing has the  _presence_ of brightness you can feel on your skin. So. Stuff like that. Sometimes, almost a sound. A ringing, or a deep hum.”

Kravitz’s unbeating, dematerialized heart squeezed tight in his chest. The sensation of his heart, he supposed, moved by words that weren’t meant to be poetic. “Uh,” he said. “…Can you tell me where I can get some of these?”

“Well I don’t  _know,_ Kravitz, I thought follow-up questions were illegal.”

“You wanna, um.” He held the glasses out. “…You wanna watch while I open a rift? Or. I guess, do you wanna be open to arcane energies via these glasses while I do?”

Taako blinked at him, surprised. “That’s not a question,” he pointed out, limbs finally unfolding as he reached out to take the glasses.

How did he  _do_ that? It wasn’t arcane sight, so how?

“Those are really cool,” he admitted. “And I…kinda wanna know what it feels like? To you? When I open a rift? I mean.” He shrugged somewhat helplessly. “Well, now I’m curious.”

Taako’s laugh as he put on the glasses was ridiculous and beautiful and oh  _no._  This wasn’t what he’d come here for at all.

“Okay, bone daddy,” Taako teased. “Open up a  _whoa.”_  He stood up to get closer to the portal, thoroughly distracted from whatever joke he’d been about to make. “This is amazing! Here, you use these.” He handed the glasses back to Kravitz. “I’m gonna check it out with the field network.”

“The what?” Kravtiz asked, sliding the glasses back on. Whoa, indeed! "Oh! You mean you put that throughout the house? I was sure it couldn't stretch that far, how did you do it? Is that how you're picking up on my motion? Jeez, that must be sensitive. How'd you do it?"

"Blood," Taako said, and launched into an explanation while they both poked at Kravitz's rift.

They were still experimenting with the glasses when Julia and the others got back. Kravitz had put back on his flesh form, if only so Taako could watch the transition and take a bunch of notes with his  _genuinely invisible ink._

“I bet I could make you some for your astral eyes,” he’d said in passing, which was when Kravitz realized all of this wasn’t stuff Taako’d bought, it was stuff he’d  _built._ And that was, that was just–

His useless incorporeal heart fluttered. Shit.

By the time Julia got back, he was kind of. A little bit of a lost cause. They'd spent  _hours_ experimenting together, watching how their different magics worked, theorizing about improvements to the glasses or the field network or even the dove pin (a Calm Emotions trinket!). Taako never did tell him the whole story about Refuge, but he dropped enough nuggets for Kravitz to have a pretty solid idea of what'd gone down.

He crossed Taako's name out of his bounty book, letting the elf watch him summon it and make the alteration and let it go. He told Taako he was editing Magnus and Merle's entries so he wouldn't ask about why he was in there too.

Before Refuge, Julia hadn't been, but Taako was. The other two were. With no idea why or when. It was something of an ongoing puzzle.

Julia walked into the dorm, and Kravitz was already well on his way to smitten. Taako was vibrant and clever and actually  _really_ beautiful, and Kravitz never stood a chance.

"Oh my god," Julia breathed when she found them bent over Taako's dove pin together, trying to figure out if they could hide another charge in the pin's Astral Plane intrusion. Her entire expression filled with glee. " _Kravitz_ _,_ you–!"

"It's work-related!" Kravitz blurted. Taako blinked up at him, and he said, "No, I mean, it started as, but then we didn't, so it wasn't anymore, even though I really did!"

"Are you having a stroke?" Taako asked, brow furrowed. " _Can you_ have a stroke?" He reached out to draw a finger down Kravitz's flesh nose.

Kravitz made a garbled sound, and Julia started laughing. "Thank you for telling me about Refuge I'm sure we'll catch up again soon this has been delightful goodbye," Kravitz said, nearly all one word. He cut open a rift to the Astral Plane and hurled himself through. 

The last thing Kravitz heard before the rift closed was Taako's low, ridiculous laughter. "Don't forget to come back for those glasses," he said, promise and teasing all in one. The rift sealed tight.

Holy  _shit._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ♫Kravtiz is a nerd with a big old goopy crush♫


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I FORGOT *AGAIN*

The Director increased their training. Somehow, she managed to make it  _even worse_ than what it'd been before Refuge. Taako had basically no time to himself. Or, at least, not as much as he needed.

Kravitz had given him some great ideas for his arcane glasses, and he wanted to stay in his workshop to test them, but no. Physical fighting classes took precedent, apparently. Even over potions that could  _literally_ evaporate his enemies. Taako hated to meditate–these days it reminded him of too many things–so there just weren't enough hours in the day. Everybody made him sleep and eat and shower and train, when was he supposed to do his freaking  _actual_ work?

In the end, he only got three more sets of glasses made. One was for Kravitz, so Magnus and Merle and Julia were just gonna have to fight over the other two.

"I think this is gonna be a big one," Taako admitted when Kravitz came over to trade a bottle of wine for his freshly bespelled glasses. "Bad, maybe. The Director's being real weird about it. I mean, the Director's real weird on the regular, but this is different."

Kravitz went still beside him on the couch. Taako heard him fold up the glasses and set them aside. "Are you worried?"

"Never," Taako said, but he let Kravitz run cold fingers over his face, down his neck. He took a kiss when it was offered, and cuddled firmly into the reaper's side while they drank the wine. "Oh," he said, snapping his fingers. "I almost forgot! Here, I made this for you." He dug into the couch cushions where he was pretty sure he'd hidden– Yes, there it was. He held up the skull and crossbones lapel pin. "It's been crazy but I managed to squeeze this in." He patted around until he found the right spot on Kravitz's jacket, then secured the pin. "There we go. Reduces radiant damage, which I heard can be tricky for you."

"You fucking sap," Kravitz cooed, pulling Taako in to pepper kisses all over his face. "It's gorgeous, I love it."

Taako complained and whapped at his arm and hid his enormous grin where Kravitz couldn't see it. Once he was done goofing, Kravitz asked how he'd made it, and they got lost in another hypothesis that Taako wished he had the time to explore with actual, like, workshop hours.

"Wait, I have something for you too," Kravitz said when they finished the last drop of wine and crumb of food Taako'd brought out earlier. "Another verse to the song!" He slid arcane glasses on Taako's face. "Watch it, let me know what you think."

It was a ploy to help Taako sleep, and Taako knew it. At the same time, that didn't mean he had to  _acknowledge_ it. He settled in next to Kravitz, closing his useless eyes and letting the sensation of the reaper's bardic magic wash over him.

He woke up the next morning in his own bed. Kravitz had left a note written in his still-experimental arcane/astral ink. It was real gross and goopy. 

Taako tucked it safe in his pocket.

Training continued. Until, one day, it didn't.

The Director called them into her office, telling them about a place called Wonderland, all the things it offered, all the things it took. Taako examined the Director through his arcane glasses, felt the buzz on her, on her office, that he was beginning to realize meant  _voidfish_ _._ Felt the impression, the  _pressure,_ of her fucking Grand Relic staff.

So, that was confirmed. He slipped Angus a note when they did their traditional farewell high-five. Angus didn't even twitch. Just took the note and wished them luck. "Oh, sir," he added right before they parted ways. "It's still okay for me to use your workshop while you're gone? To keep practicing?"

Hm. They'd made no arrangements even remotely like that. What could he want the workshop for? "Course, pumpkin," Taako said, following the others toward Avi's hanger. "Just make sure you put everything back, I've got a system."

"I will, sir. Good luck!"

“Back at you, Angus.”

Once they were launched, Taako checked for listening spells and then said, "The Director is sketch as hell."

Two of the others seemed surprised. Magnus squirmed.

Taako zeroed in on him like a shark sensing blood. "Something you wanna share with the class, Mango?"

When Magnus hesitated, Julia elbowed him. "Secrets are a bad idea," she told him, voice low and sharp. "This is our family, Magnus. They deserve to know."

Magnus sighed, then unfolded what sounded like a piece of paper. Merle immediately made a surprised sound.

"I, too, am shocked," Taako said dryly. "Shocked! By the revelation of this thing on that paper."

"Sorry, Taako," Magnus said sheepishly. "It's, uh. There was that big statue in Refuge, you remember? Of the Red Robe giving the Chalice to Jack and June? Well. June gave me a drawing of the Red Robe. And it's me. It's hard to think about, hard to hold onto. But Taako, I'm the Red Robe."

"There's another voidfish," Taako said immediately. "I've been picking up bits of its static with my arcane glasses and the mobile field for ages. And the Director's staff is a Grand Relic. Neither of those are debatable. On top of all that, we only have her word that she's been destroying the Relics we bring back. Something big is going on here, and I don't think it's world saving stuff. Not with all this lying." Taako's jaw clenched so hard his teeth hurt. "She's been using us."

"So what do we do?" Magnus demanded. "Go back and confront her?"

"Uh, too late for that, thug." Taako swirled one finger around to indicate the glass cannonball they were in. "At the very least, we gotta land first."

"Let's finish the mission," Julia said, shifting Pam to sit on Taako's lap the way she did when she was feeling protective. Pam was supposed to be Julia's ranger companion, but more often than not she set the badger up as Taako's last line of defense. "The final Pam," she'd joked. Not that Pam seemed to mind; she already spent a lot of timing following Taako around growling at people, trying to steal Kravitz's shin bones, planting her feet and refusing to budge.

She was a good girl, and Taako would murder a considerable number of people before he let her come to harm.

"It'd be too suspicious not to," Merle agreed. "Maybe we can keep a closer eye on what she does with this one, track it back to the others too. That'd be some solid evidence, at least."

"What're we gonna do with evidence?" Magnus asked. "We can't, like, turn her in to the Lord of Neverwinter, and I don't know anybody who's more powerful than he is. Nobody without the voidfish juice would even be able to hear us lodge a complaint!"

"We're going to have to take this one step at a time," Julia said, leaning so hard into Magnus that Magnus squished into Taako. "Getting overwhelmed isn't going to help anybody. So, we know something fishy's going on, and we know the Director's behind it. There's nothing we can do about that until we finish up with Wonderland and go back to base."

"False," Taako said, toying with his dove pin. "I gave Angus all my notes, and he's gonna do some real good snoopin' while we're down here. I told him not to get caught or confront anybody until we can make a plan."

"That's– Taako." Magnus sounded pained. "That's. Real dangerous for him."

"Angus might be young, but he's a professional," Julia said firmly. "He never stops us from doing our jobs, and they have more risk. He'll be okay, bear. We have to believe in him."

Magnus sighed heavily. "Yeah, okay."

"So we'll get the thing, pretend nothing's wrong," Taako said. "Use the Director's faith or whatever in us to buy us some time to catch up on Angus's investigation and decide what to do."

"Sounds like a plan," Merle said. "Step one is get this Wonderland place beat. Easy enough!"

"Aw, fuck," Taako groaned. "Don't say shit like that." Pam growled in agreement.

"We're almost there," Magnus said, reaching forward to grab the brake. "You worry too much, Taako. Everything's gonna be–"

"Don't!" shouted everyone else in the glass ball. Magnus rumbled apologetically, but it was too late.

They were all fucking cursed.

Lup and Barry camped out around Wonderland for almost a month before the others showed up.

The waiting was torture. From the moment she got her body back and drank the voidfish goop Barry had saved for her, all Lup wanted to do was find Taako. She couldn't get the image of him, blind and terrified, out of her mind. To distract her from her anxiety, Barry had helped her investigate where Taako had been, what had happened to him.

Who Kalen was.

They knew the basics. About the disastrous show at Glamour Springs, the months Taako had spent running for a crime he didn't even fucking commit (arsenic couldn't be transmuted  _accidentally,_ how stupid were these people?). Taako getting caught, and the rotten core of that shitty town. A town she was going to take specific pleasure in ruining.

Someone had burned down the magistrate's temple of justice, or whatever, by the time they got there. Which was both excellent and too gods damned bad, because Lup had wanted– She just  _wanted–_

Barry helped her burn down the manor. The attic she'd found with the weirdo apothecary, a room that still had traces of Taako's blood, Taako's suffering, went first. Nobody died–mixed feelings on that one–but Kalen was living out of the inn now. She'd be back for him. For all of them.

But first: Wonderland.

At full strength, Taako, Magnus, and Merle could have taken these poser liches apart without breaking a sweat. Their gig was interesting enough, but not particularly difficult to ruin. The trick was not to play the game. Playing was consent, and their magic relied on it. As they were when they got to this planar system, the boys would have been fine.

That wasn't the case, though. Without their memories, working on half-true intel, cut off from the actual lich experts in their family, Wonderland had the potential to be absolutely ruinous. And Lup just–

Fuck, Lucretia. What were you thinking?

Barry had suggested setting alarms to watch for Taako and the rest, and then they could catch up later. There were too many ways for that to go wrong, though, too many ways for Lup to be too late. For Taako to be hurt because Lup wasn't around.

Never again.

So they set up camp in the Felicity Wilds, amusing themselves by covertly beating back the assorted animals and magical creatures trying to hunt the adventurers partying through. Lup, unable to help herself, also did her level best to scare off the adventurers. Nobody who went into Wonderland ever came out. Not surprising; only a few people on this plane would be able to really understand and dissect the trap at play here. And the Animus Bell was a solid draw. 

If they went in and took down Wonderland, Taako and the others might never show up to get the Bell. If they didn't show up, Lup's ticket to her brother–to the lunar base–vanished. She needed Taako. Taako would come to Wonderland. Wonderland had to stay standing.

Maybe she'd finally learned to be practical.

Taako and the others arrived, including Magnus's ranger wife, Julia, and her badger. Lup's breath caught. He looked...he looked so much better now. Still scarred, still  _blind,_ but he'd gotten his hands on a gorgeous staff and seemed...confident. Unafraid. Like he was comfortable with himself, owning every inch of space around him. The badger trundled along at his feet, making angry noises when Magnus or Merle got too close, then twisting back to grumble at Julia in complaint.

It was  _adorable._

Barry slid his hand into Lup's. "It's time," he murmured. "You ready for this?"

Lup squeezed his hand. "I was born ready, babe. Let's do it."

After one last kiss to her cheek, Barry led the way. "Hey, guys!" he called, waving with his free hand as he approached the group. "What're you doing here?"

Magnus swung around, surprised. His expression immediately warmed with recognition and delight. "Larry Bluejeans!" he cheered.

"It's Barry," he chuckled, finally releasing Lup's hand so he could shake Magnus's. "And, hey, this is my wife, Lup!" He brought her forward with a hand at the small of her back. "She was out of town for a while but she's back now."

"Hi," Lup said, irrationally nervous.

"Whoa," Magnus breathed. "You look just like Taako!"

Taako, previously ignoring them, perked up. He turned to nearly look Lup in the eye, one fine brow lifting in condescension. "Nobody looks this good," he scoffed.

"Uh," Julia said.

At that, Taako's casual dismissal turned to annoyance. He slid a pair of glasses perched in his hair (what Lup assumed was an ironic accessory) down onto his nose. His eyes didn't focus–would never focus on her again–but something about the quality of his attention sharpened. "Huh," he said. "It's not a spell." He held out a hand so imperiously Lup actually rolled her eyes. "Come closer. Let me examine you."

"We're...kind of in the middle of something?" Barry said, even as Lup got close enough to her brother that he could draw his fingers over her nose and cheek bones, across her forehead, along her jaw. Lup  _ached_  at his expression, the curious and pondering one she only saw when he was engaged with a genuinely interesting problem. 

"Are you going into Wonderland too?" Julia asked. "Hey! Maybe we could team up!" She nudged Magnus. "It's supposed to be really dangerous, so more heads have got to be better."

"I guess you're not hideous," Taako decided finally, tapping one finger to Lup's forehead. "But I don't have to believe we, like,  _match._ Lots of elves look  _pretty_ alike, enough for humans, anyway."

"I think you look the same too," Merle chimed in.

"Luckily nobody asked you," Taako said. He tossed his hair over his shoulder. "Okay, well. If Julia wants to team up, I  _suppose_  we can. Barold Fancypants, you're a fighter, right? We could use more muscle between me and everything else."

"I'm actually a wizard," Barry said. "My specialization is, uh. Necromancy? But I dabble in a lot of other stuff too."

"Well that's creepy," Taako said. He nodded toward Lup. "What're you bringing to the table, copycat?"

Lup laughed. "If I'm older, does that mean you're the copy?" she asked.

Taako narrowed his eyes at her. "Why would you be older? Anyway, who cares, it's not like we're actually related. I was here first, so you're the copy."

"How do you know you were here first?" Lup asked.

"Pam," Taako ordered, "eat her."

The badger, who had been nosing around Lup's feet, taking in her scent, looked back at Taako, then seemed to shrug. She rumbled over to Julia and sat.

"Whoa," Magnus breathed. "Secret siblings theory confirmed. I've never seen her not hate  _anyone_ other than Taako and Julia!"

"We don't have to be secret siblings," Taako sulked. "Pam could just like pretty people."

"Yeah but she hates Kravitz," Magnus pointed out.

Taako's grin went lecherous. "Maybe she got confused by the way he makes me scr–"

"OKAY." Magnus clapped his hands. "So! Are we going in or what?"

"Do you have a boyfriend?" Lup asked, surprised. "A  _pretty_ boyfriend? How long have you been–"

"We still don't know what the doppelganger can do," Taako said over her. He dug around in his satchels to produce two more pairs of glasses. "And we haven't decided who else is getting equipped with the other arcane glasses."

Lup blinked. She looked at Barry, who stared back, sharing her surprise. "Where did you get arcane  _glasses?"_ she asked.

Taako sneered and looked ready to lie about it, but Magnus swelled with pride and said, "He made them! Taako's an artificer and basically a potions guru."

"That's amazing," Barry admitted. "How long have you been doing that?"

Taako's ears dipped flat. The others all tensed, eyes on Taako. Merle touched his elbow. "That's none of your gods damned business," Taako said, low and dangerous.

So. Since Kalen, then.

"I don't really care, personally," Lup said, keeping her tone casual. "The glasses probably won't work for us anyway. Better give 'em to your friends."

"Won't work–!" Taako swelled with indignation, all but hurling the glasses at her. With astonishingly good aim, too. Weird. He gave the others to Barry when he stuck out an eager hand for them. "Put 'em on, fuckface!"

"If mine's a fuckface," Lup said, squinting through the glasses before sliding them on, "then yours is too, dingus. That's how–whoa." She looked around in amazement, stunned by the beauty of the magic all around them. Wonderland wasn't just that shitty tent building, it stretched out for  _ages._ Tendrils of the Bell's influences seemed to reach all the way through the forest and out into the world. Fuck, this was how the liches kept drawing in all their victims. The Animus Bell was like a poison, slowly creeping out into the rest of Faerun.

"This is amazing," Barry said, turning his head to all kinds of weird angles while keeping his eyes on Wonderland, looking like a huge dork with Taako's glasses stacked over his own. "Can I keep these?"

"For now," Taako said with a magnanimous sniff. He pushed his own glasses back to the top of his head. "...They'll give you a headache, though. Don't keep 'em on too long. And what," he stressed to Lup, "is it that you do?"

"I'm a level sixteen Evocation wizard," she said, holding out her own hands to watch them light up. By chance, she lifted her eyes to Taako just as a kind of...energy sprung up around him, generated from a linked network of necklace, rings, and anklets, humming around him like magnetic fields. 

"Holy shit what's that?" Barry blurted.

"We're not here to talk about my bomb-ass inventions," Taako snapped. "We're here to fuck up Wonderland." He turned to the others. "Are we doing this or not? As you assholes seem to have forgotten, this isn't the only thing on our agenda today!" He flailed a hand at Wonderland. "Sterling and those other losers have already gone in! Let's  _go._ "

"I'm not done playing with these glasses," Lup said. She hooked her arm through one of Taako's. "Lead the way, secret sibling."

Taako's arm was tense under hers. Then he sighed, a frustrated huff of air, and linked their arms a little more firmly. " _Fine_ ," he grumbled.

The six of them stepped into Wonderland, through a door inscribed with their names. Music started, and flashing lights. Taako scowled, rubbing one ear. Lup gave the Wonderland liches props for style, but negative one million for substance. Through the lenses of the arcane glasses, the room was startlingly bare. Even their colorful lighting was fake.

"Zero out of ten points," Lup called right in the middle of their speech. "You got real lazy about this, didn't you?"

"They didn't even anchor any of it to the structure itself," Barry said, squinting at the wall. "A well-placed Whirlwind would tear this whole thing to the ground." He half-turned toward them. "Hey Taako, do you think–"

Taako wobbled a little, falling into Lup's side. She steadied him with an arm around his waist. "Koko?" she said, soft and just for him. 

"Dizzy," he said, shaking his head.

Ah, fuck.

"It relies on visual stimulation," Barry realized at about the same time she did. "You're picking up a bunch of illusion magic but don't have any way to parse it. Or, no alternative way. It's trying to  _force_ you to see it."

"Poor guy," the female lich cooed. "Say, let's make a deal!"

"We'll give you back your vision while you're in Wonderland," the male agreed. "And if you win, who knows! Maybe you can keep it."

"Fuck off," Taako said, warbling and sick.

"Well I thought this was going to be a fun romp," Lup said, helping Taako sit when his knees buckled. "But I guess we're just gonna have to do the quick version instead." Taako listed against her, expression miserable. "Take the lead on this, will you, Bar?"

"Sure thing," Barry and Magnus said in unison. They started at each other in surprise.

Julia laughed. "Oh! I call Magnus bear, you know, because he's very like one. And Bar for Barry! I feel like we're already friends," she teased Lup.

"We'll have them duke it out for Bear Prime later," Lup laughed.

"Hey," the female lich said, annoyance leaking in. "You can't just ignore us. We're–"

"I'll bring the popcorn," Julia said right over her. Lup grinned, immensely charmed. Julia set Pam to guard Taako, then turned to the others, hands on her hips. "So! I guess we're fucking these guys up, huh? And we'll figure the Bell out later." She drew a long white arrow, gleaming with power, out of her quiver. "Let's see how much they like my present from Istus."

"Just don't play the game," Barry warned them, letting some of his own necromagic spill into his hands. "Doing pretty much anything the way they want us to would kind of be agreeing to be part of this needlessly complicated ritual, and we don't want that."

"Excuse me," the male lich said, offended. "You're in Wonderland now. You can't just–"

"In a minute," Barry said. He turned to the others. "Now, my plan is to break some of their foci, and then you should be able to, y'know, punch 'em in the face a bit, Magnus. Merle, anything you've got with radiant damage would be real great for this. Julia, let's see if we can scratch out some of the runes with your arrows. Okay, who's ready to get started?"

The liches tried one more time to protest, so Barry nailed them with Silence and directed his attention back to the team, pointing out weak spots in Wonderland to attack.

"This is fuckin'  _lame,"_ Taako grumbled. "All that gods-forsaken training was  _useless."_

"Nah,"  Lup said, finger-combing the tangles out of his ridiculously long hair. "Just wait, Barry'll sort this out. He knows how much you like stomping on your enemies, he'll save the juicy bits."

After a long minute of silence (other than the increasing controlled explosions that meant Barry was doing good work), Taako asked, "How would Barry know that?"

Lup blinked down at him. "Hmm?"

Taako shifted, trying to sit up but instantly regretting it, if the way his face scrunched up and went pale was any indication. "Barold. He ran a job with the others, I guess, but I wasn't there. We've never met before today. So how would  _he_ know if I like stomping people?"

Ah, fuck. Lup fought a sigh. "That's...a little hard to explain, Koko. I'm sorry." She felt his weird field stretch, sliding over her skin just enough to raise all the hair on her arms. "Jeez, that's tingly," she muttered.

"You've..." He pressed his lips together, then pushed the arcane glasses up to rub firmly at the skin between his eyes. 

"Headache?" she asked, heart twisted in sympathy. Taako'd always been more susceptible to migraines when they were younger. It sucked, thinking about how many he must have weathered without her. All by himself, or in the clutches of that  _man,_ before he found the others. Before he'd gotten back the people who loved him.

"Why do you know me?" he asked. Something about his tone was...not angry, the way she always assumed he'd be when she inevitably forgot to pretend she didn't know him. Not wistful, either, like she'd let herself daydream once or twice. More exhausted than anything. "Is this a trick?"

Lup resisted the urge to rub his back. "No, babe. Promise. You... There's this thing," she said, trying to think of a way to talk around what Lucretia had deleted. "It's called a voidfish. Can you hear me when I say that?"

Taako whipped around to face her, eyes wide, expression hard. "How do you know about the voidfish?"

"It took my memories, once," she said. "Real important ones. Not just the Relics, but. Better ones than that. Deeper. I got them back, though, and you. You're one of those, Koko. One of the deep, important memories. I'm sorry I can't explain it better, I–"

"Where was it?" he demanded, wobbling dangerously when he tried to force himself up. "I know she has another voidfish, where  _is it?"_

"How did you know?" Lup asked, gripping his shoulders to hold him steady. "You shouldn't be able to know!"

"You think that static doesn't resonate with arcane energy?" he scoffed. " _Please._  I might not know what we lost but I know we lost  _something._  Maybe..." He frowned at the ground. "I figured it must be something, like, planar, the way it worked with the Relics. Are you...suggesting that it's more personal than that?"

"Taako, babe? Listen to me." Lup carefully slid her hands up Taako's shoulders to cup his face. "I'm going to tell you what I am to you, and you tell me what you hear. Okay? Taako, I am your twin sister."

Something...dangerous twisted Taako's face. Furious, undercut with despair that Lup never wanted to see again. "When Magnus said secret sibling, I... It's hard to think. You feel so familiar. I know I should be able to think it and I can't, there's  _static_ just in the thought, Lup! Lup, who are you?" Taako grabbed her wrists, hanging on desperately. "Why can't I think of who you are? She must have taken this from me, Lup, what did she  _take–"_

"Shh," Lup soothed, "shh, shh, Taako, it's okay. I've been waiting for you, do you hear me? As soon as I could, I started waiting for you. Now that I'm here, now what we're together? Taako, there's  _nothing_ we can't do. And that includes getting goop from the second voidfish. I waited for you, and you found me, and we're going to make this right. Nobody's going to stop that from happening. Not even Lucretia. This bullshit ends today."

Barry finally cracked enough of Wonderland that the illusions fell. Taako drew in a long, sharp breath, then blew it out in relief. Lup stood with a stretch, making room so Taako could stand next to her. She didn't offer a hand or reach out to steady him when he shook. 

Taako could stand on his own.

"You wanna bust some lich heads?" she asked her brother, holding out her hand. 

"Hell yeah, homie, let's do this." Taako slid his hand into hers, squeezing tight. His expression flickered, confused and pained. Their hands fit so well, with such perfect symmetry. They'd been born that way. They were made for this.

He wouldn't be able to think about it without pain until they got to that second voidfish. So Lup set eyes on the liches, across the room trying to fight with Barry, who was ignoring them while he give what looked like a lecture to Magnus, Merle, and Julia. She nudged Taako. "I'll describe where they are, you get some target practice?"

Taako pulled his staff off his back, setting his stance so Pam could stand guard between his feet. "Pull!" he said.

Lup laughed, startled, and shouted directions. Taako shot off a Disintegrate that clipped the male lich, sending him spinning and melting into his sister. They immediately switched their focus to Lup and Taako. While Barry deconstructed Wonderland with his team of assistants, Lup and her brother deconstructed the liches.

It was the most fun she'd had in  _years._

Maybe this was all gonna work out okay after all.

Which was, just. She had a hundred years on the run, nearly a decade in an umbrella, and several snooping months with Barry to stop thinking shit like that. To stop jinxing them all.

When they got out of Wonderland, the Hunger was there. It wasn't attacking yet, but it had  _found them._ And only Barry and she could see it.

_Fuck._

"We need to get to that second voidfish  _now,"_  Lup said, watching Hunger tendrils writhe through the sky. "Stuff's about to get real ugly real fast."

Taako didn't have a bracer to call for one of the glass cannonballs, but the other three did. They packed in tight so Barry and Lup could fit too. Angus was waiting for them when they arrived, and he knew where the other voidfish was. Not still in Lucretia's office, of course. Hidden.

And he'd found it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There are only two more chapters to this fic, then I've been working on a sequel for, like.
> 
> Ages.
> 
> It's fighting me a bit


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HERE.
> 
> TAKE IT.
> 
> This is the last chapter! WOO!
> 
> I'm working on a sequel but I'm a touch stuck. We'll seeeeee

A lot of things went wrong. They had to fight new friends, dodge the Hunger, break into Lucretia's hiding spot. She was there, and tried to talk them out of it. The Hunger was  _here,_ and she was trying to stop them from helping. Davenport was with her, dressed as a butler or something, mindless with all he'd lost. Barry Charmed him into drinking the voidfish goop when the others did, and–

A  _lot_ of things went wrong.

Taako collapsed. Magnus and Merle, Davenport. They all went down. 

"Lucretia," Davenport said, fury sparking in his voice. "What have you  _done?"_

"Magnus," Julia said, gripping him tight around the shoulders where he was pillowed on her lap. "Bear, love, are you okay?"

"Julia," he said, panting, "fuck,  _fuck_ , Julia! The Hunger– We can't, we  _can't–"_ He turned to Davenport, frantic. "Please, Captain,  _please,_ don't make us leave, we  _can't–"_

"Koko?" Lup whispered, pushing the hair out of his face as he began to come to. "Babe, are you with me?"

Taako's blank eyes turned in her direction. His hand spasmed in hers. Every inch of his body began to shake.

"Please," Lucretia begged. "I'm so close! We can save this plane, protect it from the Hunger  _forever._  We can finally have a place–"

The sound Taako made then wasn't a scream. It wasn't quite a sob, either. It was an animal noise of such profound loss that it made tears spring up in Lup's eyes. She curled her body over his, trying instinctively to protect him from a blow he'd already taken, a wound layered now over a hundred years of fighting.

An injury he could have fixed, or prevented, or never been exposed to in the first place. If.

"There has to be a third way," Barry said to Lucretia, still trying to talk her out of her doomed plan. "Severing this plane's bonds won't save it, Lucretia, it'll kill  _everything._ There must be another way!"

"There isn't," Lucretia said, solemn and sure, gathering her power. "I'm sorry, but I have to–" Black tentacles lashed up around her, preventing her escape. Lucretia turned to Taako, surprised, and flinched at whatever she saw there. "I'm sorry," she said, voice breaking. "I didn't know, Taako. I swear. I would have–"

Taako whole body heaved with the force of his gasping breaths.

"Please, Taako, you have to keep it together," Lup whispered into her hair. "Babe, please,  _please,_ we have to figure this out first."

"My plan will work," Lucretia insisted.

"Lucretia,  _come on,_ " Magnus cut in, finally climbing back to his feet. "Taako's  _blind_ because you separated us. He was alone and vulnerable and Kalen got him, and he's  _blind!_ How isn't that enough to convince you that your plan is  _flawed?_ You didn't expect this, and it happened anyway. You can't still think you've got everything figured out perfectly!"

"We got a prophesy about your plan, Lucy," Merle said, one arm around Davenport so they could lean on each other. "What you wanna do, it's world-ending. We saw it ourselves, back in Refuge. There's a third option between runnin' and breaking the bonds."

"No  _fuck,"_ Taako spat, power crackling over his skin like he would...like he was gonna attack Lucretia. Like he could break her without a pause. "It's not even a hard one to figure out! We could have saved this world years ago and you– You took my magic and my  _sister_ and broke my family and– Why did you send me down there?" he shouted around a sob, struggling in Lup's hold, fighting against her and they didn't have the  _time_ for this! "You kept–Davenport, why–! Why did you cut me off and cripple me and send me down there alone?" Taako's spine curved, curling his whole body back hard against Lup's. "He–blinded me! He threw acid in my eyes and blinded me, he–! Magnus wouldn't have needed me to save Raven's Roost if he knew himself, I could have gotten away, I could have– But he caught me and–" At last his fury turned to tears, dripping down his cheeks onto the floor as sobs broke in his lungs. "Lup Lup Lup he caught me, gods gods he caught me."

"Please, Koko," Lup gasped, rocking with him, her own tears mingling with his. "John's here, we have to–"

"What could John do," Taako sobbed, "worse than this? Let him have this place. Let him  _have Kalen–_ "

Merle let go of Davenport, crossing the room to take Taako's face his in hands. He waited, quiet, while Taako focused in on him, ears and eyes turning in his direction. "Taako," he said, low and sad. "Kid. You've come back out of this once before, and I know you can do it again. I don't have any magic left; that plane's already gone, I think. But– Bud, I'm sorry, I know this is hard, especially for you. You know I've got Mavis and Mookie here. Julia's here, and Pam. Your Kravitz, too, the sap. They can't come with us, if we go."

"They won't survive here," he spat, "if we let her break the bonds. If we take the Light and  _go,_ they could at least survive–"

Angus dropped to the floor by Taako to grab his nearest shin. "Sir," he blurted, hands clenched desperately, voice thick with tears. "Please don't leave me."

"Angus," Taako groaned, lashing out with a hand to catch the back of his head. "Angus, I can't let her–"

"You said you knew the third option," Davenport interrupted, flanking Taako's other side, gripping the elf's shoulder tight and warm the way he always did. Taako's expression buckled. "You're a student of the Institute of Planar Research and Exploration, Taako. A wizard of the Starblaster. You are now, and you always will be. This is your mission. How do we beat the Hunger?"

"Cast the barrier," Taako said, head bowing forward in agreement, hand still curved in Angus's hair. "But cast it around the Hunger. It's still a plane. Don't cut off this world, cut off the  _Hunger."_

"Would it work?" Davenport asked, not looking back at Lucretia

"Yes," she said, visibly shocked by the idea. "Yes, I– I can do that. But I'd need to be on the plane when I cast it. I'd need to be on the  _Hunger."_

Davenport nodded, squeezed Taako's shoulder, and finally faced Lucretia. "Where is the Starblaster?"

Before they left to cast the spell, Lup and Magnus each had a demand. Magnus made them put the baby voidfish–Junior–in with Fisher. And Lup made Davenport take them to a glassing, so her kickass baby Transmutation brother could reconnect the planes. Magnus's side quest resulted in their story and song being transmitted via happy voidfish across every plane in the system.

("Holy shit, bear," Julia said, eyes filled with wondrous tears, hands cradling Magnus's face. "You're–you're a fucking  _rocket scientist!")_

Lup's ended in Taako exploding a food wagon and summoning a tall, handsome man from the Astral Plane who kissed him a little desperately before touching a finger to the dove pin Taako wore in his hair these days. Almost immediately, Taako's shoulders relaxed. He tipped his head back, eyes shut, while the guy kissed his forehead. "Come back safe, dove," he murmured.

"Sap," Taako said, more sigh than anything else. 

"Oh hey, is this the screaming badger guy?" Lup asked, wreathed in flame as she detoured from her reign of chaos to meet her baby bro's boyfriend. "Kravitz, right?"

"Screaming badger guy?" Kravitz said, entirely in despair while he shook Lup's hand. "I'm...I'm an emissary of the Raven Queen, the  _Grim Reaper_ , I don't even–"

"We have to go!" Magnus shouted down from the Starblaster. "Merle got pulled into a parley, I don't think we have a lot of time left. Taako, kiss your boyfriend and let's get a move on!"

Taako pulled on Kravitz's lapels until he bent for another kiss, then ran up the gangplank. Lup wanted to go too, but–

Somebody had to stay and lead the fight on the ground. And she'd been  _aching_ for a good excuse to blow up some bad guys. Barry would stay with her, and Kravitz seemed willing enough to team up, throwing in an enormous soul monster, which was.

Yeah, that was pretty cool.

"We're going to have to talk about the fact that you're liches after this," Kravitz said, back to back with her as they fought to save the world.

"Sure thing, Ghost Rider," she said. "Whoever gets the most monsters picks the location."

"Deal," Kravitz said immediately. It was a hard battle, long and exhausting. Every moment, Lup was dreading that familiar pull of Bond energy that meant the Starblaster's mission had failed. But it never happened. They fought, together, and won.

They  _won._

The Hunger was gone.

They were free.

 

When Kravitz finally stuffed Legion back in the Stockade and made it to the We Saved The World party, Taako wasn't there. His family was--the family Kravitz had met before and the rest who he only knew through the Story and Song--as well as his moon base coworkers, filling the usually tidy Reclaimers Dorm with an astonishing number of people. For just a moment, Kravitz nearly left again, overwhelmed by the noise and movement and energy. But--

He also really wanted to see Taako.

Magnus spotted him while he was still dithering. "Kravitz!" he called, one arm wrapped firmly around Julia's waist, the other raising a mug of beer to wave at him. "Buddy! You survived!"

Julia giggled wildly, flushed with victory and/or alcohol, and buried her face in her husband's shoulder. "You can't just tell people they survived," she laughed.

"Sure I can," Magnus said, beaming. He propped his chin on the top of Julia's head. "Because we did!"

"It only took like a hundred and ten  _years,"_  Lup crowed, loping over to Kravitz, also apparently thoroughly drunk. "Screaming badger guy, you're just in time!"

"That's not my name," Kravitz signed, letting her tow him into the room, deeper into the throng of bodies. They passed an orc refilling mugs from what looked like a cask of home-brewed beer, another orc and a dragonborn making out heavily in the corner, various assorted other beings in silver bracers all celebrating. It felt like the whole moon base was crammed into this one dorm. Wouldn't it have made more sense to throw a party on the quad?

"I mean, you answer to it, so. Anyway!" She smacked a hand against his shoulder. "Listen, Koko's hermited himself away in his room, and Pam won't let me in. I figure I could take her in a fight, but Julia says I have to play nice, or Pam won't like me anymore.  _Every_ one keeps saying Taako's room is--" She made elaborate air quotes. "-- _off limits_  and I have to  _respect the no_ until he explicitly lets me in. Me!" She flung her arms out, smacking Merle in the back of the head as they passed. "His own twin! But that's okay, you're here and you got a yes at some point or you wouldn't be screaming badger guy, would you?"

"I'm actually not the--" Kravitz tried to protest.

Lup shoved him down the hallway so hard he nearly tripped. "Good luck, Ghost Rider!"

"We still have to talk about how you and Barry are  _liches,"_  Kravitz protested.

"Later," Lup said with the cadence of a lie. She pounced on Barry, forcing him to stagger forward and then loop his arms under her legs so she was properly piggybacked. She blew a raspberry into the back of his neck and he giggled, squirming, but never actually broke his train of thought in whatever conversation he was having with Davenport. The captain, for his part, pushed Lup's foot down so it wasn't directly in his face and didn't otherwise even blink.

Kravitz wondered if this was how they'd been, all those cycles, those endless years on the Starblaster. He tried to imagine Taako in the mix, maybe goofing with his sister, maybe the center of as much attention as possible. It was...difficult. The Taako he knew had already developed a distaste for crowds by the time Kravitz stumbled into his life.

How strange, to watch Lup laugh and drink and chat, and know once Taako must have been the same. And now...

Well.

Pam was curled up right outside Taako's door. Usually he'd let her in; he must be feeling especially overwhelmed to bar even her. It occurred to him that maybe leaving Taako alone would be the best thing for him.

Then again, Kravitz hadn't seen Taako since the world didn't end. Since the best transmutation wizard in a hundred planar systems turned glass into sapphire to summon him from a nightmare. It had been a bad enough day that Kravitz cracked Taako's door open regardless of whether or not it was a good idea, stepped carefully over Pam--who eyed him mistrustfully but didn't do anything else except grumble--and went inside. Once he shut the door behind him, the whole room fell into darkness. Kravitz waited for his eyes to adjust, then looked for his elf.

Taako was curled against the headboard of his bed, legs drawn up with his arms looped around them, forehead resting on his knees. His hair was a loose cascade of gold, without even the dove pin to hold it in place. The ear Kravitz could see was twisted low and back. He looked--

"Hello, dove," Kravitz murmured, leaning against the door. "Bit of a busy day, wasn't it?"

After a moment of stillness, Taako lifted his head. "Kravitz?" he asked.

"I survived," Kravitz agreed on a chuckle. "Or so Magnus tells me, anyway. Have you eaten?"

"There's enough food out there for ten armies," Taako said, head tilted down but both ears swiveled in Kravitz's direction. "Lup and I spent like three hours cooking. Are you gonna come give me a Holy Shit We Lived mack sesh or what?"

Kravitz immediately shed his coat and shoes, crawling in among Taako's hoard of pillows to pull him close. Taako cuddled into his hold in a manner that was both charming and a genuine concern.

Holding Taako didn't usually feel like Taako was trying to hide.

"Don't think I didn't notice that you avoided my question," Kravitz said into the soft warmth of Taako's hair. He hid a kiss among the locks. "You'll have to eat at some point, it was a  _really_ long day."

"I've had longer," Taako muttered. Then he seemed to think about it. "Well," he amended, "not recently, though. We'll grab nosh later, okay? It's-- There's just. A  _lot."_

Kravitz hummed thoughtfully. "What's the capacity of your field network these days?" he asked. "A party this size must have overwhelmed it."

Taako's shoulders drooped in relief: blaming the field network would be a  _lot_ easier than admitting to the emotional distress that had almost certainly driven him here. "Like eight or nine people is the max I can track accurately, thug. There's gotta be at least twenty people out there."

The number was almost certainly closer to forty, but Kravitz didn't bother pointing it out. "Well, we have a lot of catching up to do anyway. I'm sure no one will miss us for a few minutes."

Taako rolled his eyes so hard his whole head turned. "Krav, my man, my dude, my guy, if Lup didn't bodily fling you into this room, she's not the sister I remember. We are  _already_ late rejoining the party, and you just got here. I escaped an hour ago. I'm honestly surprised she hasn't dragged me out by my ears."

"Your sister loves you," Kravitz said.

"That's the problem," Taako agreed. "I'm...I'm not. Listen, she expects--" He faltered, frustrated, and burrowed a little further into Kravitz. For a moment, Kravitz thought he was going to manage to articulate whatever big worry had consumed him, and stroked his hair patiently. In the end, all Taako did was sigh. "I guess we have to face the music."

"Not yet," Kravitz insisted. He pressed his face into the curve of Taako's throat, enjoying the warmth, the way his pulse skipped and the breath caught in his lungs. A shiver worked down Taako's spine when Kravitz smiled against his skin. "You can stay with me a bit longer, can't you?"

"Lup already calls you screaming badger guy," Taako said weakly. "You gonna give her more ammunition?" He tilted his head back to give Kravitz even more lovely, soft skin to explore.

"Why  _does_ she call me that?" he complained, nipping at Taako's jaw when he laughed. "Far be it from me to make that nickname somehow  _worse._ " He sat up, ignoring Taako's grumbled complaint. "I think it's our duty to check on the Astral Plane, don't you? My home in particular might require thorough investigation."

Taako laughed again, letting Kravitz pull him to his feet, melancholy apparently forgotten. "Hell yeah, stud, let's play hooky!"

The door to Taako's room flew open. "Don't you fucking dare!" Lup demanded, foiled in her attempt to leap after them when Pam got one of her pant legs and yanked hard. Lup fell flat on her face.

Kravitz cut a rift through to the Astral Plane.

"Later, sis!" Taako chirped, hand clasped tight with Kravitz's as they made their escape.

"The nookie had better be worth it!" Lup shouted.

"It will be," Taako called back. Kravitz's face burned with a blush but he didn't deny it. Their party was going to be  _much_ more fun than Lup's. When the rift closed, Taako squeezed Kravitz's hand and switched his hold so he could tuck his fingers in the crook of Kravitz's arm. "Well? C'mon, bones, show me around!"

Kravitz drew his arcane glasses out of his breast pocket--the ones Taako was using to experiment with astral energy too--and slid them on Taako's face. "I think you're going to like this," Kravitz said.

Taako turned toward Kravitz, as though he was examining him through the glasses. Then he squeezed Kravitz's butt with that same innocent expression from the first time they met. "I'm sure I will," he said guilelessly. 

"If that's how you want to play it," Kravitz sighed, as put-upon a sound as he could pretend to make with the smile stretched across his face. Before Taako could register movement, he was already flying through the air to land over Kravitz's shoulder with a surprised huff. "We'll do the tour some other time."

Taako's laughter echoed through the manor, warm and alive as nothing had been on this plane for time unmeasured. The world was saved. They were safe, and together, and happy.

And everything was perfect.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey if you could see anything in a sequel, what would it be? Tell me all your thoughts. Help me get un-stuck!

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on tumblr! [ Come visit me :D ](http://distractedkat.tumblr.com)


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